I 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 

in  2007  with  funding  from 

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http://www.archive.org/details/developmentofintOObinerich 


^" 


yi~6?u^-^A. 


(1857-1911) 


PUBLICATIONS  OF  THE  TRAINING  SCHOOL  AT  VINELAND 
NEW  JERSEY 

DEPARTMENT  OF  RESEARCH 


THE 

DEVELOPMENT  OF  INTELLIGENCE 

IN  CHILDREN 

(THE  BINEX-SIMON  SCALE) 


BY 

ALFRED  BINET,  Sc.D  and  TH.  SIMON,  M.D. 


TRANSLATED  BY 

ELIZABETH  S.  KITE 

Diplome  d'TnstrUction  Primaire  Superieure 

Paris  le  23  juillet,  1905 

Member  of  the  Staff  of  the  Vineland 

Research  Laboratory 


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^&/     OEVOTCO     ''76% 
0^:'  TO  THE         \0% 

^3*;      INTERESTS  OF    t^  ^ 
^>:     THOSE  WHOSE     1*2 

%^:  MINDS  MAVr  NOT   *^*^ 


NO.  11,  MAY,  1916 


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Copyright,  1916 

BY 

Henry  H.  Goddard 


1916 

WILLIAMS  &  WILKINS  COMPANY 

BALTIMORE 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTERS  PAQH 

Editor's  Introduction 5 

I.    Upon  the  Necessity  of  Establishing  a  Scientific  Diagnosis  of  In- 
ferior States  of  Intelligence.     {L'Annee    Psych.,    1905,    pp. 

163-191) 9 

II.     New  Methods  for  the  Diagnosis  of  the  Intellectual  Level  of 

Subnormals.     (UAnnee  Psych.,  1905,  pp.  191-244) 37  "^ 

III.  Application  of  the  New  Methods  to  the  Diagnosis  of  the  In- 

tellectual Level  among  Normal  and  Subnormal  Children  in 
Institutions  and  in  the  Primary  Schools.  {L'Annee  Psych., 
1905,  pp.  245-336) 91       ,f^«' 

IV.  The    Development    of    Intelligence    in    the    Child.      {UAnnSe  "^ 

Psych.,  1908,  pp.  1-90) 182 

V.    New  Investigations  upon  the  Measure  of  the  Intellectual  Level 

among  School  Children.     {V Annie  Psych.,  1911,  pp.  145-201)  274 


87/ 


INTRODUCTION 

The  first  contribution  of  Drs.  Binet  and  Simon  to  the  problem 
of  measuring  intelligence  appeared  in  L'Ann^e  Psychologique  for 
1905.  This  volume  reached  America  early  in  1906.  The  Vine- 
land  Research  Laboratory  for  the  psychological  study  of  feeble- 
mindedness was  opened  in  September  of  the  same  year.  My  first 
work  as  director  of  this  Laboratory  was  to  search  the  literature 
for  anything  that  bore  upon  the  problem.  The  above  article  had 
attracted  so  little  attention  from  the  American  psychologists 
that  in  spite  of  dilligent  search  in  bibliographies,  reviews,  original 
sources  and  by  appeals  to  personal  friends,  Binet 's  work  in  this 
line  was  never  brought  to  my  attention.  It  was  not  until 
the  Spring  of  1908  when  I  made  a  visit  to  Europe  in  the  inter- 
ests of  the  work  that  I  learned  of  the  tests.  On  that  trip  a  visit 
was  made  to  Dr.  Decroly  in  Brussels.  Dr.  Decroly  and  Mile. 
Degand  had  just  completed  a  try-out  of  tests  by  Drs.  Binet  and 
Simon  of  Paris.  Upon  my  return  home  I  began  at  once  to  use 
the  tests  on  the  children  of  the  Training  School,  employing 
Decroly's  article  as  the  source  of  information.  Later  I  obtained 
Binet's  article.  These  were  the  **1905'*  tests,  not  the  scale.  In 
December  1908  I  published  a  six-page  account  of  these  tests. 

In  1909  appeared  L'Annee  Psychologique  giving  the  ''Scale,'* 
with  the  grading  by  years.  Probably  no  critic  of  the  scale  dur- 
ing the  past  six  years  has  reacted  against  it  more  positively  than 
did  I  at  that  first  reading.  |  It  seemed  impossible  to  grade  intel- 
ligence in  that  way.  It  was  too  easy,  too  simple.  1  The  article 
was  laid  aside  for  some  weeks.  One  day  while  using  the  old 
tests,  whose  inadequacy  was  great,  the  new  Scale  came  to  mind 
and  I  decided  to  give  it  a  fair  trial.  In  January  1910  we  pub- 
lished the  first  abstract  of  the  scale — being  a  brief  summary  of 
the  1908  Binet-Simon  article. 

i  Our  use  of  the  scale  was  a  surprise  and  a  gratification.  It 
met  our  needs.  A  classification  of  our  children  based  on  the 
Scale  agreed  with  the  Institution  experience.  Soon  others  be- 
gan to  use  the  scale.  Then  came  the  critics.  Their  criticisms 
showed  such  a  thorough  misunderstanding  of  the  plan,  purpose 

5 


358871 


6  INTRODUCTION 

and  spirit  of  the  authors  of  the  Scale  that  we  reaUzed  what  an 
injustice  had  been  done  by  pubHshing  our  condensed  outline — 
16  pages  out  of  90.  We  at  once  resolved  to  publish  a  complete 
translation.  Permission  was  obtained  from  Dr.  Simon  and  the 
work  was  begun.  It  had  to  be  crowded  in  with  other  work  of 
the  Laboratory,  and,  hence,  there  have  been  many  delays.  At 
last,  however,  the  book  is  presented  to  the  public.  We  regret 
the  delay,  but  perhaps  the  present  is  the  best  time  for  presentation. 
Certainly  it  was  never  more  needed  than  now. 

It  will  seem  an  exaggeration  to  some  to  say  that  the  world 
is  talking  of  the  Binet-Simon  Scale;  but  consider  that  the  Vine- 
land  Laboratory  alone,  has  without  effort  or  advertisement  dis- 
tributed to  date  22,000  copies  of  the  pamphlet  describing  the 
tests,  and  88,000  record  blanks.*  This  in  spite  of  the  fact  that 
the  same  matter  has  been  freely  published  in  numerous  other 
places.  The  Scale  is  used  in  Canada,  England,  Australia,  New 
Zealand,  South  Africa,  Germany,  Switzerland,  Italy,  Russia,  China, 
and  has  recently,  been  translated  into  Japanese  and  Turkish. 

The  literature  on  the  Scale  has  increased  enormously;  in  1914 
there  was  already  a  bibliography  of  254  titles;  yet  in  all  this 
time  no  complete  translation  of  Binet's  work  on  the  Scale  has 
appeared.  A  number  of  criticisms  have  appeared,  many  of 
which  could  not  have  been  written  if  Binet's  complete  discussion 
of  his  Scale  had  been  available,  to  the  critics. 

It  is  little  less  than  marvelous  that  the  tests  have  had  such  a 
remarkable  acceptance  even  in  the  mutilated  form  of  our  con- 
densed abstract.  That  the  Scale  was  so  eminently  useful  in  this 
abbreviated  form  shows  the  masterly  work  of  the  authors. 

By  many  persons  the  Measuring  Scale  of  Intelligence  is  sup- 
posed to  be  a  mere  incidental  chapter  in  Binet's  work.  Scarcely 
anyone  in  America  realizes  to  what  an  extent  it  was  his  magnum 
opus.  That  his  writings  on  this  subject  fill  a  book  of  this  size 
will  be  a  great  surprise.  And  yet  this  is  only  the  half.  Another 
volume  the  size  of  this  (already  translated  and  which  we  hope 
soon  to  publish)  is  devoted  to  the  appHcation  of  the  Scale.  More- 
over, many  other  writings  of  Binet  show  how  large  a  place  it 
occupied  in  his  thinking. 

*{Note:  This  pamphlet  is  a  16-page  condensation  of  Chapter  IV  of  this 
book,  with  such  revisions  as  our  experience  with  the  tests  on  American 
children  seemed  to  justify.) 


INTRODUCTION  7 

This  book  as  a  whole  constitutes  a  complete  history  and  ex- 
position of  the  Measuring  Scale  as  Binet  left  it. 

In  Chapter  I  the  authors  show  the  origin  of  the  Scale  and  their 
first  methods  of  attacking  the  problem. 
^-"-^  Chapter  II  describes  the  first  results — a  series  of  test  questions 
arranged  in  order  of  difiiculty  but  not  yet  assigned  to  definite 
years.  An  immense  amount  of  work  had  been  done  on  this  series, 
and  the  authors  may  have  been  justly  proud  of  what  they  had 
accomplished,  though  it  was  soon  to  be  largely  discarded  for  a 
much  more  useful  plan.  This  was  the  so  called  ''1905  Tests.'' 
/^  Chapter  III  shows  the  laborious  and  painstaking  methods  of 
standardization.  Nowhere  does  Binet  more  clearly  show  his 
genius.  It  is  here  that  he  has  taught  us  the  method  which  must 
be  used  in  all  extensions  or  revisions  of  the  Scale,  that  lay  any 
claim  to  scientific  value. 
/  _ JiL  Chapter  J V  he  gives  us  the  Measuring  Scale  for  IntelU- 
gence — the  so  called  1908  Scale.  It  is  the  most  complete  state- 
ment of  the  Scale. 

Chapter  V  gives  some  of  his  later  1911  corrections  and  revisions 
— his  last  word  on  the  subject.^  In  making  up  this  book  we 
have  attempted  to  include  everything  Binet  and  Simon  wrote 
explanatory  of  the  Scale.  The  reader  will  find  many  repetitions 
and  some  contradictions,  and  the  date  of  each  article  should  be 
taken  into  account  in  deciding  which  is  the  authoritative  state- 
ment. It  has  been  thought  best  to  include  all  of  these  repetitions 
and  contradictions,  in  order  to  show  the  development  of  Binet's 
own  thought  in  regard  to  his  Scale.  Only  in  this  way  does  the 
marvelous  work  that  he  did  on  this  subject  become  fully 
appreciated. 

The  translation  has  given  rise  to  the  usual  translator's  difficul- 
ties. Binet  at  times  uses  not  only  highly  technical  terms  but 
also  terms  of  his  own  invention.  The  usual  ''untranslatable 
expressions"  are  found.  Moreover,  it  is  clear  that  typographical 
errors  occasionally  crept  in.  Where  this  was  certain  and  it  was 
clear  what  the  correct  form  should  have  been,  we  have  taken  the 
liberty  of  making  the  correction.     Where  we  have  been  unable 

1  In  this  year  he  also  prepared  a  final  statement  of  the  Scale  for  the 
"Bulletin  de  la  Soci^te  libre  pour  TEtude  psychologique  de  I'Enfant." 
This  has  been  translated  by  Dr.  Clara  Harrison  Town,  Lincoln,  Illinois, 
1913. 

« 


8  INTRODUCTION 

to  correct,  we  have  kept  the  error,  leaving  the  reader  of  this 
book  the  same  problem  that  faces  the  reader  of  the  original.  Cases 
of  this  sort  will  be  discovered  in  some  of  the  tables  that  do  not 
"total"  as  they  should. 

In  the  question  of  free  or  literal  translation,  we  have  held 
more  closely  to  the  literal,  especially  with  the  test  questions. 
This  literalness  seemed  necessary  in  order  to  show  as  exactly 
as  possible  Binet's  plan.  But  naturally  it  renders  the  questions, 
in  many  cases,  inapplicable  to  American  children. 

In  regard  to  the  translation,  the  editor  feels  that  the  skill 
and  ability  of  Miss  Kite  have  given  a  most  readable  book.  Miss 
IQte  is  eminently  fitted  for  the  task.  She  holds  a  ''Diplome 
d'Instruction  Primaire  Sup^rieure,  Paris  le  23  juillet  1905."  But 
more  than  that  she  is  skilled  in  the  use  of  the  tests  and  is  a  close 
student  of  the  writings  of  Binet  and  Simon. 

Many  persons  from  this  Laboratory  have  taken  part  in  this 
work,  in  the  way  of  reading  and  suggesting  revisions;  notably. 
Miss  Eleanor  A.  Gray,  and  Miss  Flora  Otis,  Librarian,  also  Mr. 
E.  A.  Doll,  Assistant  Psychologist,  and  Miss  Florence  Mateer. 
We  are  also  indebted  to  Rev.  Ernest  Monge  of  Faribault,  Minn., 
for  the  original  translation  of  a  part  of  the  fourth  chapter. 

Henry  H.  Gqddard, 
Editor, 
Vineland,  N.  J.,  1916.  \ 


o^ 


UPON  THE  NECESSITY  OF  ESTABLISHING  A 

SCIENTIFIC  DIAGNOSIS  OF  INFERIOR 

STATES  OF  INTELLIGENCE 

VAnnee  Psychologique  1905  pp.  163-191 

We  here  present  the  first  rough  sketch  of  a  work  which  was 
directly  inspired  by  the  desire  to  serve  the  interesting  cause  of 
the  education  of  subnormals.  " 

In  October,  1904,  the  Minister  of  PubUc  Instruction  named 
a  commission  which  was  charged  with  the  study  of  measures 
to  be  taken  for  insuring  the  benefits  of  instruction  to  defective 
children.  After  a  number  of  sittings,  this  commission  regulated 
all  that  pertained  to  the  type  of  establishment  to  be  created, 
the  conditions  of  admission  into  the  school,  the  teaching  force, 
and  the  pedagogical  methods  to  be  employed.  They  decided 
that  no  child  suspected  of  retardation  should  be  eliminated  from 
the  ordinary  school  and  admitted  into  a  special  class,  without 
first  being  subjected  to  a  pedagogical  and  medical  examination 
from  which  it  could  be  certified  that  because  of  the  state  of  his 
intelligence,  he  was  unable  to  profit,  in  an  average  measure,  from 
the  instruction  given  in  the  ordinary  schools. 

But  how  the  examination  of  each  child  should  be  made,  what 
methods  should  be  followed,  what  observations  taken,  what 
questions  asked,  what  tests  devised,  how  the  child  should  be 
compared  with  normal  children,  the  commission  felt  under  no 
obligation  to  decide.  It  was  formed  to  do  a  work  of  administra- 
tion, not  a  work  of  science. 

It  has  seemed  to  us  extremely  useful  to  furnish  a  guide  for 
future  Commissions'  examination.  Such  Commissions  should 
understand  from  the  beginning  how  to  get  their  bearings.  It  must 
be  made  impossible  for  those  who  belong  to  the  Commission  to 
fall  into  the  habit  of  making  haphazard  decisions  according  to 
impressions  which  are  subjective,  and  consequently  uncontrolled. 
Such  impressions  are  sometimes  good,  sometimes  bad,  and  have 
at  all  times  too  much  the  nature  of  the  arbitrary,  of  caprice,  of 
indifference.     Such  a  condition  is  quite  unfortunate  because  the 

9 


10  DEVELOPMENT    OF   INTELLIGENCE 

interests  of  the  child  demand  a  more  careful  method.  To  be 
a  member  of  a  special  class  can  never  be  a  mark  of  distinction, 
and  such  as  do  not  merit  it,  must  be  spared  the  record.  Some 
errors  are  excusable  in  the  beginning,  but  if  they  become  too 
frequent,  they  may  ruin  the  reputation  of  these  new  institutions. 
Furthermore,  in  principle,  we  are  convinced,  and  we  shall  not 
cease  to  repeat,  that  the  precision  and  exactness  of  science  should 
be  introduced  into  our  practice  whenever  possible,  and  in  the 
great  majority  of  cases  it  is  possible. 

The  problem  which  we  have  to  solve  presents  many  difficulties 
both  theoretical  and  practical.  It  is  a  hackneyed  remark  that 
the  definitions,  thus  far  proposed,  for  the  different  states  of 
subnormal  intelligence,  lack  -  precision.  These  inferior  states 
are  indefinite  in  number,  being  composed  of  a  series  of  degrees 
which  mount  from  the  lowest  depths  of  idiocy,  to  a  condition 
easily  confounded  with  normal  intelligence.  Alienists  have 
frequently  come  to  an  agreement  concerning  the  terminology 
to  be  employed  for  designating  the  difference  of  these  degrees; 
at  least,  in  spite  of  certain  individual  divergence  of  ideas  to  be 
found  in  all  questions,  there  has  been  an  agreement  to  accept 
idiot  as  applied  to  the  lowest  state,  imhecile  to  the  intermediate, 
and  moron  (debile)*  to  the  state  nearest  normality.  Still  among 
the  numerous  alienists,  under  this  common  and  apparently  pre- 
cise terminology,  different  ideas  are  concealed,  variable  and  at 
the  same  time  confused.  The  distinction  between  idiot,  imbecile, 
and  moron  is  not  understood  in  the  same  way  by  all  practitioners. 
We  have  abundant  proof  of  this  in  the  strikingly  divergent  medi- 
cal diagnoses  made  only  a  few  days  apart  by  different  alienists 
upon  the  same  patient. 

Dr.  Blin,  physician  of  the  Vaucluse  Asylum,  recently  drew 
the  attention  of  his  fellow  physicians  to  these  regrettable  con- 
tradictions.    He  states  that  the  children  who  are  sent  to  the 

*The  French  word  dSbile  (weak)  is  used  by  Binet  to  designate  the 
highest  grade  of  mental  defectives,  called  in  England  feeble-minded.  In 
America  the  term  feeble-minded  has  been  used  in  the  same  sense,  but 
unfortunately  it  is  also  applied  generically  to  the  entire  group  of  mental 
defectives.  To  obviate  this  ambiguity,  we  coined  the  word  MORON 
(Greek  Moros,  foolish)  to  designate  the  highest  grade  of  mental  defect. 
We  have  accordingly  translated  debile  by  moron,  except  in  a  few  instances 
where  the  context  requires  a  different  term. — Editor. 


^ 


NECESSITY   FOR   SCIENTIFIC   DIAGNOSIS  11 

colony  come  provided  with  several  dissimilar  certificates.  "One 
child,  called  imbecile  in  the  first  certificate,  is  marked  idiot  in 
the  second,  feeble-minded  (debile)  in  the  third,  and  degenerate 
in  the  fourth."^  M.  Damaye,  former  house  surgeon  of  Dr.  Blin, 
adds  this  observation:  ''One  would  have  only  to  look  through 
several  folders  of  records  belonging  to  children  of  the  colony, 
in  order  to  collect  almost  the  same  number  of  different  diagnoses. ^'^ 
Perhaps  this  last  affirmation  is  a  little  exaggerated,  but  a  statis- 
tical study  would  show  the  exact  truth  on  this  point. 

We  cannot  sufficiently  deplore  the  consequence  of  this  state 
of  uncertainty  recognized  today  by  all  alienists.  The  simple 
fact,  that  specialists  do  not  agree  in  the  use  of  the  technical  terms 
of  their  science,  throws  suspicion  upon  their  diagnoses,  and 
prevents  all  work  of  comparison.  We  ourselves  have  made  simi- 
lar observations.  In  synthesizing  the  diagnoses  made  by  M. 
Bourneville  upon  patients  leaving  the  Bicetre,  we  found  that  in 
the  space  of  four  years  only  two  feeble-minded  individuals  have 
left  his  institution  although  during  that  time  the  Bureau  of  Ad- 
mission has  sent  him  more  than  thirty.  Nothing  could  show 
more  clearly  than  this  change  of  label,  the  confusion  of  our  nomen- 
clature. 

What  importance  can  be  attached  to  public  statistics  of  differ- 
ent countries  concerning  the  percentage  of  backward  children 
if  the  definition  for  backward  children  is  not  the  same  in  all  coun- 
tries? How  will  it  be  possible  to  keep  a  record  of  the  intelligence 
of  pupils  who  are  treated  and  instructed  in  a  school,  if  the  terms 
applied  to  them,  feeble-minded,  retarded,  imbecile,  idiot,  vary 
in  meaning  according  to  the  doctor  who  examines  them?  The 
absence  of  a  common  measure  prevents  comparison  of  statistics, 
and  makes  one  lose  all  interest  in  investigations  which  may  have 
been  very  laborious.  But  a  still  more  serious  fact  is  that,  be- 
cause of  lack  of  methods,  it  is  impossible  to  solve  those  essential 
questions  concerning  the  aflfllicted,  whose  solution'  presents  the 
greatest  interest;  for  example,  the  real  results  gained  by  the 
treatment  of  inferior  states  of  intelHgence  by  doctor  and  educa- 
tor; the  educative  value  of  one  pedagogical  method  compared 
with  another;  the  degree  of  curability  of  incomplete  idiocy,  etc. 

^  Blin,  Les  d^bilites  mentales,  Revue  de  psychiatrie.    A6ut,  1902. 
'  Damaye.    Essai  de  diagnostic  entre  les  Stats  de  dibilite  mentale.    Th^se 
de  Paris,  Steinheil,  1903. 


12  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

It  is  not  by  means  of  a  priori  reasonings,  of  vague  considera- 
tions, of  oratorical  displays,  that  these  questions  can  be  solved; 
but  by  minute  investigation,  entering  into  the  details  of  fact, 
and  considering  the  effects  of  the  treatment  for  each  particular 
child.  There  is  but  one  means  of  knowing  if  a  child,  who  has 
passed  six  years  in  a  hospital  or  in  a  special  class,  has  profited 
from  that  stay,  and  to  what  degree  he  has  profited;  and  that  is 
to  compare  his  certificate  of  entrance  with  his  certificate  of  dis- 
missal, and  by  that  means  ascertain  if  he  shows  a  special  ameliora- 
tion of  his  condition  beyond  that  which  might  be  credited  simply 
to  the  considerations  of  growth.  But  experience  has  shown  how 
imprudent  it  would  be  to  place  confidence  in  this  comparison, 
when  the  two  certificates  come  from  different  doctors,  who  do 
not  judge  in  exactly  the  same  way,  or  who  use  different  words 
to  characterize  the  mental  status  of  patients. 

It  might  happen  that  a  child,  who  had  really  improved  in 
school,  had  received  in  the  beginning  the  diagnosis  of  moron 
(debile),  and  on  leaving,  the  prejudicial  diagnosis  of  imbecile, 
simply  because  the  second  doctor  spoke  a  different  language 
from  the  first.  If  one  took  these  certificates  literally,  this  case 
would  be  considered  a  failure.  On  the  contrary,  the  appear- 
ance of  amelioration  would  be  produced  if  the  physician  who 
delivered  the  certificate  of  dismissal  had  the  habit  of  using  higher 
terms  than  the  one  who  furnished  the  certificate  of  entrance. 
One  can  even  go  further.  The  errors  which  we  note,  do  not 
necessarily  emanate  from  the  disagreement  of  different  physicians. 
It  would  suffice  for  the  same  physician  to  deliver  the  two  certifi- 
cates, if  he  did  not  employ  for  each  one  the  same  criterion;  and 
it  would  certainly  be  possible  for  him  to  vary  unconsciously 
after  an  interval  of  several  years  if  he  had  nothing  to  guide  him 
but  his  own  subjective  impressions.  Might  not  the  same  thing 
also  happen  if  his  good  faith  as  a  physician  happened  to  be  in 
conflict  with  the  interests  of  the  institution  which  he  directed? 
Might  he  not  unconsciously  as  it  were,  have  a  tendency  to  lower 
the  mental  status  of  patients  on  entering  and  to  raise  it  on 
dismissal,  in  order  to  emphasize  the  advantages  of  the  methods 
which  he  had  applied?  We  are  not  incriminating  anyone,  but 
simply  calling  attention  to  methods  actually  in  use  which,  by 
their  lack  of  precision,  favor  the  involuntary  illusions  of  physicians 
and  relatives,  in  a  word,  of  all  those  who,  having  an  interest  in 


NECESSITY   FOR   SCIENTIFIC   DIAGNOSIS  13 

the  amelioration  of  the  condition  of  the  defective  child,  would 
have  a  tendency  to  confound  their  desires  with  the  reality. 

Perhaps  someone  will  raise  an  objection  and  say  this  uncer- 
tainty, has  no  special  appH cation  to  diagnosis  of  the  degrees  of 
mental  debility;  it  is  also  to  be  found  in  mental  pathology  and, 
in  a  general  way,  in  the  diagnosis  of  all  maladies;  it  is  the  result 
of  the  empirical  nature  which  is  characteristic  of  clinical  studies. 
It  might  be  added,  that,  if  anyone  took  the  trouble  to  make  a 
statistical  study  of  the  divergence  in  the  diagnosis  of  different 
physicians  upon  the  same  patient,  it  would  probably  be  found 
that  the  percentage  of  disagreement  is  very  great  in  all  branches 
of  medicine. 

We  believe  it  worth  while  to  examine  their  objection  because 
it  permits  us  to  enter  more  deeply  into  the  analysis  of  the  question. 
The  disagreements  of  practitioners  might  come  from  three  very 
different  classes  of  causes: 

1.  Ignorance,  that  is,  the  lack  of  aptitude  of  certain  physicians. 
This  is  an  individual  failure,  for  which  abstract  science  is  not 
responsible.  It  is  certain  that,  even  when  the  symptoms  of  a 
disease  are  absolutely  clear,  such  a  physician  might  fail  to  recog- 
nize them  through  incapacity.  There  are  many  accountants 
who  make  mistakes  in  calculation,  but  these  errors  do  not  dis- 
credit mathematics.  A  physician  might  not  be  able  to  recog- 
nize a  ^'p.  g."  if  he  is  himself  a  '^p.  g.'' 

2.  The  variable  meaning  of  terms.  Since  the  same  expression 
has  a  different  sense  according  to  the  person  who  uses  it,  it  is 
possible  that  the  disagreement  of  diagnosis  may  be  simply  a 
disagreement  of  words,  due  to  the  use  of  different  nomenclature. 

3.  Lack  of  precision  in  the  description  of  the  symptoms  which 
reveal  or  which  constitute  a  certain  particular  malady;  different 
physicians  do  not  examine  the  same  patient  in  the  same  manner 
and  do  not  give  the  symptoms  the  same  importance;  or,  it  may 
be  they  make  no  effort  to  find  out  the  precise  symptoms,  and  no 
effort  to  analyze  carefully  in  order  to  distinguish  and  interpret 
them. 

Of  these  three  kinds  of  error,  which  is  the  one  that  actually 
appears  in  the  diagnosis  of  inferior  states  of  intelligence?  Let  us 
set  aside  the  first.  There  remain  the  faults  of  nomenclature, 
and  the  insufficiency  of  methods  of  examination. 

The  general  belief  seems  to  be  that  the  confusion  arises  wholly 


14  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

from  an  absence  of  a  uniform  nomenclature.  There  is  some 
truth  in  this  opinion.  It  can  be  proved  by  a  comparison  of 
terms  used  by  authors  belonging  to  the  different  countries.  Even 
in  France  the  terms  differ  somewhat  according  to  the  physician, 
the  order  of  the  admitted  subdivisions  not  being  rigorously  fol- 
lowed. The  classification  of  Magnan  is  not  that  of  Voisin,  and 
his,  in  turn,  differs  from  that  of  Bourneville.  Undoubtedly 
it  would  be  a  good  work  to  bring  about  a  unification  of  this  nomen- 
clature as  has  been  done  for  the  standard  of  measurements  and 
for  electric  units.  But  this  reform  in  itself  is  not  sufficient  and 
we  are  very  sure  that  they  deceive  themselves  who  think  that 
at  bottom  this  is  only  a  question  of  terminology.  It  is  very 
much  more  serious.  We  find  physicians  who,  though  using  the 
same  terminology,  constantly  disagree  in  their  diagnosis  of  the 
same  child.  The  examples  cited  from  M.  Blin  prove  this.  There 
the  doctors  had  recourse  to  the  terminology  of  Morel,  who  classi- 
fies those  of  inferior  intelligence  as  idiots,  imbeciles  and  "debiles.^^ 
Notwithstanding  this  use  of  the  same  terms,  they  do  not  agree 
in  the  manner  of  applying  them.  Each  one  according  to  his 
own  fancy,  fixes  the  boundary  line  separating  these  states.  It 
is  in  regard  to  the  facts  that  the  doctors  disagree. 

In  looking  closely  one  can  see  that  the  confusion  comes  princi- 
pally front  a  fault  in  the  method  of  examination.  When  an  alienist 
finds  himself  in  the  presence  of  a  child  of  inferior  intelligence, 
he  does  not  examine  him  by  bringing  out  each  one  of  the  symp- 
toms which  the  child  manifests  and  by  interpreting  all  symptoms 
and  classifying  them;  he  contents  himself  with  taking  a  subjective 
impression,  an  impression  as  a  whole,  of  his  subject,  and  of  mak- 
ing his  diagnosis  by  instinct.  We  do  not  think  that  we  are  going 
too  far  in  saying  that  at  the  present  time  very  few  physicians 
would  be  able  to  cite  with  absolute  precision  the  objective  and 
invariable  sign,  or  signs,  by  which  they  distinguish  the  degrees 
of  inferior  mentality. 

A  study  of  the  historical  side  of  the  question  shows  us  very 
clearly  that  what  is  lacking  is  a  precifie  basis  for  differential 
diagnosis. 


NECESSITY   FOR   SCIENTIFIC   DIAGNOSIS  15 

A  Few  Historical  Notes 

PINEL,    ESQUIROL,    SEGUIN,    MOREL,    BOURNEVILLE,    SOLLIER, 

BLIN 

It  is  perfectly  useless  to  enumerate  all  the  authors  who  have 
attempted  to  classify  idiocy.  In  medicine  as  in  other  sciences 
there  are  a  number  of  writers  of  secondary  rank  who  repeat  the 
work  of  those  who  have  gone  before,  making  but  insignificant 
alterations.  We  shall  note  only  those  who  have  brought  new 
ideas  and  changed  the  direction  of  study. 

Pinel  devoted  a  chapter  of  his  medico-philosophical  treatise 
on  Mental  Derangement,  to  * 'Idiocy,  or  the  Obliteration  of  the 
Intellectual  and  Affective  Faculties."  But  he  confounds  the 
states  of  stupor  and  dementia  with  actual  idiocy,  ''that  which 
is  so  from  the  beginning,"  regarding  which  he  makes  one  observa- 
tion; one  paragraph  is  reserved  for  the  "Cretins  of  Switzerland." 

Esquirol  was  the  first  to  differentiate  idiocy;  he  develops  this 
fact  in  great  detail  and  certainly  understood  its  importance. 
Ordinarily  when  anyone  cites  the  names  of  Esquirol  in  a  history 
of  idiocy  it  is  to  bring  out  the  fact  that  we  owe  to  him  a  classi- 
fication of  idiocy  founded  upon  the  power  of  speech.  It  is  true 
that  Esquirol  has  made  this  classification.  We  give  the  passage 
in  its  entirety. 

Speech,  that  essential  attribute  of  man,  which  has  been  given  him  that 
he  may  express  his  thought,  speech,  being  the  sign  most  constantly  associa- 
ated  in  idiots  with  the  intellectual  capacity,  gives  the  character  to  the  prin- 
ciple varieties  of  idiocy.  In  the  first  degree  of  imbecility,  speech  is  free  and 
easy.  In  the  second  degrefe  it  is  less  easy,  the  vocabulary  more  limited. 
In  the  first  degree  of  idiocy  proper,  the  idiot  uses  only  words,  with  short 
sentences.  Idiots  of  the  second  degree  articulate  only  monosyllables  or 
some  cries.  Finally  idiots  of  the  third  degree  have  neither  speech,  phrase, 
word,  nor  monosyllables.^ 

That  is  all.  E^^quirol  relates  a  number  of  interesting  observa- 
tions reg9' Jing  imbeciles  and  idiots,  which  form  perhaps  the 
most  suggestive  part  of  his  study;  but  nowhere  does  he  under- 
take to  introduce  his  classification  by  speech;  but,  on  the  con- 
trary, by  a  total  of  the  symptoms.  Moreover,  if  he  had  attempted 
an  application,  he  would  have  seen  that  the  condition  of  speech 

*Des  Maladies  mentaleSf  II,  p.  340. 


16  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

is  not  always  sufficient  to  characterize  the  degree  of  mental  in- 
feriority. We  are  therefore  disposed  to  see  in  the  so-called  classi- 
fication only  one  of  those  accessory  ideas  which  germinate  in 
the  mind  of  an  author  and  to  which  he  attaches  only  relative 
importance.  The  talent  of  Esquirol  did  not  develop  in  this  line. 
His  real  work  consists  in  having  definitely  separated  idiocy  from 
other  conditions  which  seem  to  resemble  it,  by  a  lack  or  by  an 
equivalent  diminution  of  exterior  signs  of  intelligence.  Condi- 
tions which  simulate  idiocy  are  stupor  and  different  demential 
states.  It  is  incontestable  that  Esquirol,  by  the  insistence  with 
which  he  developed  these  different  points,  shows  the  importance 
which  they  had  for  him.  We  purpose  allowing  the  reader  to 
be  his  own  judge  by  making  extensive  extracts. 

Notice  in  the  first  place  how  Esquirol  defines  idiocy.  It  is 
he  who  first  used  the  term  idiocy  as  a  substitute  for  idiotism, 
the  word  employed  before  his  time,  which  has  since  been  reserved 
for  grammatical  use.     He  says 

Idiocy  is  not  a  malady,  it  is  a  state  in  which  the  faculties  are  never 
manifested,  or  have  never  developed  sufficiently  for  the  idiot  to  acquire 
the  knowledge  which  other  individuals  of  his  age  receive  when  placed 
in  the  same  environment.  Idiocy  begins  either  with  life,  or  during  that 
/  period  which  precedes  the  complete  development  of  the  affective  and  in- 
^/  tellectual  faculties;  idiots  are  what  they  must  remain  during  the  entire 
course  of  their  lives.  Everything  in  the  idiot  reveals  an  organism  either 
of  arrested  or  of  imperfect  development.  It  is  not  possible  to  conceive 
of  changing  this  condition.  Nothing  can  give  to  these  unhappy  beings, 
even  for  a  moment,  more  reason  or  more  intelligence.  They  do  not  attain 
to  an  advanced  age,  seldom  living  to  be  over  thirty.  When  the  brain 
is  examined,  defects  of  structure  are  nearly  always  found. 

Immediately  following  this  is  a  passage  in  which  Esquirol  dis- 
tinguishes idiocy  from  insanity.  This  distinction  is  extremely 
important.     It  is  worth  while  to  quote  his  own  words. 

Insanity  and  idiocy  differ  essentially,  or  else  the  principles  of  all  classi- 
j&cation  are  illusions.  Insanity,  like  mania  or  mono-mania  does  not  com- 
mence before  puberty;  it  has  a  period  of  growth  more  or  less  rapid.  In- 
sanity, such  as  senile  dementia,  increases  from  year  to  year  by  the  wear- 
ing away  of  the  organs  or  by  the  successive  loss  of  different  faculties.  All 
the  symptoms  show  physical  weakness;  all  the  features  are  drawn,  the 
eyes  dull,  depressed;  and  if  the  insane  man  wishes  to  act,  he  is  moved  by 
a  fixed  idea  which  has  survived  the  general  loss  of  intelligence.  Insanity 
may  be  cured;  one  can  conceive  the  possibility  of  suspending  the  symptoms; 
there  is  a  diminution,  or  privation  of  the  forces  necessary  to  exercise  the 


NECESSITY   FOR   SCIENTIFIC   DIAGNOSIS  17 

faculties,  but  the  faculties  still  exist.  A  shock  of  the  moral  nature,  medi- 
cines, might  awaken  him  or  arouse  sufficient  force  to  produce  the  mani- 
festation of  some  ideas,  of  some  affection;  other  means,  too,  might  remove 
the  obstacles  which  suspend  ^their  manifestation. 

If  a  man  having  become  insane  does  not  succumb  rapidly,  he  may  run 
through  a  long  course  and  arrive  at  a  very  advanced  age. 

When  an  autopsy  is  performed,  one  sometimes  finds  organic  lesions 
but  they  are  accidental,  because  the  thickening  of  the  bones  of  the  skull, 
or  the  spreading  of  the  cranial  plates  ("recartement  de  leur  tables,")  coin- 
cident with  senile  dementia,  do  not  in  the  least  constitute  defects  of  con- 
formation. It  is  the  same  with  the  alterations  and  changes  in  the  sub- 
stance of  the  brain  caused  by  the  progress  of  age. 

The  insane  man  is  deprived  of  possessions  which  he  formerly  enjoyed; 
he  is  a  rich  man  become  poor;  the  idiot  has  always  been  in  misery  and 
want.  The  state  of  the  insane  may  Vary,  that  of  the  idiot  remains  always 
the  same.  The  one  conserves  much  of  the  appearance  of  the  complete 
man,  the  other  retains  many  traits  of  infancy.  In  one  case  as  in  the  other, 
there  are  no  sensations  or  practically  none;  but  the  insane  man  shows  in 
his  organization  and  also  in  his  intelligence  something  of  his  past  per- 
fection; the  idot  is  such  as  he  has  always  been,  he  is  all  that  he  can  ever 
be  relative  to  his  primitive  organization. 

A  few  lines  farther  on,  Esquirol  makes  another  distinction  be- 
tween idiocy  and  other  mental  states  which  resemble  it  only  in 
appearance.     It  seems  useful  to  reproduce  this  passage  also. 

But  there  are  individuals  who  seem  to  be  void  of  sensibility  and  in- 
telligence, who  are  without  ideas,  without  speech,  without  movement, 
and  who  remain  where  they  are  placed,  who  must  be  dressed  and  fed. 
Are  they  not  idiots?  No,  surely  not.  These  are  not  the  diagnostic  symp- 
toms. A  single  epoch  in  a  malady  cannot  give  an  abstract  idea  of  it;  on 
the  contrary  one  must  see  and  study  this  malady  in  all  its  states,  each 
one  of  which  should  furnish  some  factor  to  the  diagnosis.  I  have  pre- 
viously given  the  history  of  a  girl  who  offered  all  the  symptoms  which 
one  takes  ordinarily  for  the  signs  of  idiocy.  That  girl  was  terrified,  and 
it  was  fear  that  chained  the  exercise  of  all  her  faculties.  I  cared  for  a 
young  man  27  years  of  age,  who,  deceived  by  a  woman  and  failing  to  se- 
cure the  place  he  wanted,  after  an  attack  of  insanity,  fell  into  a  state  of 
apparent  idiocy.  The  face  of  the  invalid  was  highly  colored,  his  eyes 
fixed  and  uncertain,  his  countenance  without  expression;  it  was  neces- 
sary to  dress  and  undress  him  and  to  put  him  to  bed;  he  did  not  eat  unless 
the  food  was  put  into  his  mouth;  his  arms  hung  at  his  sides  and  his  hands 
were  swollen;  he  always  stood  but  never  walked  unless  someone  forced 
him  to  do  so;  he  seemed  to  have  neither  feeling  nor  thought.  Leeches 
applied  to  the  temples,  tepid  baths,  cold  douches  on  the  head,  and  above 
all  a  general  eruption  of  the  skin  cured  him.  This  young  man  told  me, 
after  his  restoration  to  health,  that  a  voice  within  him  kept  repeating, 
"Don't  move,  or  you  are  lost."     Fear  made  him  immovable.     Intelligence, 


18  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

sensitiveness  are  therefore  not  lost,  but  the  manifestation  of  these  faculties 
is  hindered  by  different  motives  of  which  the  patients  are  conscious  when 
they  are  cured.  During  my  clinical  lessons  of  1822,  we  had  at  the  Sal- 
pdtriere  a  young  woman,  B.,  who  seemed  to  be  in  the  most  profound  stu- 
por and  in  a  state  of  absolute  insensibility;  she  remained  sitting  by  her 
bed  and  never  spoke.  Many  times  I  pinched  and  struck  her  without  her 
showing  signs  of  pain.  I  had  a  seton  placed  on  her  neck  and  several  blis- 
ters applied  to  different  parts  of  the  skin,  always  with  the  same  apparent 
lack  of  sensation;  the  same  obstinate  silence,  the  same  refusal  to  walk. 
One  day  this  young  woman  did  not  appear  at  the  clinic,  and  after  that 
nothing  could  induce  her  to  return.  When  she  was  cured,  she  told  me  that 
one  of  the  pupils  had  pinched  her.  This  impertinence  angered  her.  What 
was  permissable  for  me  was  not  for  the  others  and  she  resolved  never 
again  to  appear.  Certain  monomaniacs,  dominated  by  ideas  of  love  or 
of  religion,  show  the  same  symptoms.  Certainly  in  all  of  these  cases,  the 
sensuous  and  intellectual  faculties  exercise  themselves  with  energy;  ap- 
pearances are  deceptive;  these  are  by  no  means  cases  of  idiocy. 

Following  Esquirol,  there  are  a  great  number  of  authors  who, 
one  after  the  other,  have  attempted  to  define  idiocy  and  other 
inferior  states  of  intelligence,  and  who  have  presented  a  subdivi- 
sion and  sometimes  a  classification  of  the  different  degrees  of  in- 
feriority of  inteUigence.  To  make  a  complete  history  it  would  be 
necessary  to  study  the  attempts  of  Belhomme,  Seguin,  FeUx 
Voisin,  Morel,  Marce,  Griesinger,  Luys,  Schule,  Chambard,  Ball, 
Dagonet,  Ireland,  Jules  Voisin,  Magnan,  Sollier,  Bourneville. 

Two  principal  types  of  classification  have  been  given;  the  classi- 
fication according  to  symptoms  and  the  anatomo-pathological 
or  etiological  classification. 

The  latter  are  the  less  frequent,  the  less  usual.  We  can  cite 
two  examples,  one  from  Ireland,  the  other  from  Bourneville. 

Ireland,^  while  recognizing  that  it  would  be  of  great  interest  to 
take  account  of  the  exact  intellectual  symptoms  of  idiots,  be- 
heves  that  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  treatment,  and  especially 
for  prognosis,  the  generating  cause  of  idiocy  must  be  taken  into 
account.  In  his  book,  he  makes  a  separate  study  of  the  follow- 
ing etiological  classes: 

1.  Genetous  Idiocy. 

2.  Microcephalic  Idiocy. 

3.  Hydrocephalic  Idiocy. 

4.  Eclampsic  Idiocy. 

*  W.  W.  Ireland,  The  mental  affections  of  children,  idocy,  imbecility 
and  insanity,  London,  1900,  p.  39. 


NECESSITY   FOR   SCIENTIFIC   DIAGNOSIS  19 

5.  Epileptic  Idiocy. 

6.  Paralytic  Idiocy. 

7.  Traumatic  Idiocy. 

8.  Inflammatory  Idiocy  (the  result  of  Encephalitis). 

9.  Sclerotic  Idiocy. 

10.  Syphilitic  Idiocy. 

11.  Cretinism  (including  the  Endemic  and  Sporadic  or  Myxoedematous 
Forms). 

12.  Idiocy  by  Deprivation. 

In  spite  of  the  great  interest  of  these  distinctions,  we  cannot 
find  any  hght  for  us  in  this  classification,  especially  from  a  peda- 
gogic point  of  view,  because  the  form  of  inferior  mentality  with 
which  we  most  often  have  to  do  is  what  Ireland  calls  congenital 
idiocy;  it  is  necessary  to  know  the  degrees  of  this,  and  Ireland 
does  not  furnish  us  the  means  of  distinguishing  them. 

We  would  make  the  same  remark  in  regard  to  the  pathological 
classification  of  Bourneville  which  differs  but  little  from  the  pre- 
ceding.    Here  it  is : 

1.  Hydrocephalic  Idiocy. 

2.  Microcephalic  Idiocy. 

3.  Idiocy,  symptomatic  of  arrest  of  development  of  the  convolutions. 

4.  Idiocy,  symptomatic  of  a  congenital  malformation  of  the  brain 
(porencephaly,  absence  of  corpus  callosum,  etc.). 

5.  Idiocy,  symptomatic  of  atrophic  sclerosis;  sclerosis  of  one  hemisphere, 
or  of  two  hemispheres,  sclerosis  of  one  lobe  of  the  brain,  sclerosis  of  iso- 
lated convolutions,  sclerosis  of  the  brain. 

6.  Idiocy,  due  to  hypertrophic  or  tumorous  sclerosis. 

7.  Idiocy,  symptomatic  of  meningitis  or  chronic  meningo-encephalitis. 

8.  Idiocy,  with  pachydermic  cachexia,  myxoedematous  idiocy. 

Bourneville  was  the  first  to  study  several  of  the  preceding  forms, 
porencephalous  and  myxedematous  idiocy. 

In  spite  of  the  interest  of  this  classification,  it  cannot  serve  as  a 
faithful  guide  for  study  during  the  life  of  the  patient,  in  whom  the 
nature  of  the  lesions  is  often  very  obscure. 

We  shall  therefore  set  aside  the  etiologic  and  anatomo-patho- 
logic,  restricting  ourselves  to  symptomatic  classifications. 

After  having  carefully  examined  several  of  the  latter  we  are  now 
convinced  that  it  will  not  be  necessary  to  analyze  all  because  all 
are  conceived  along  the  same  lines.  It  is  of  Uttle  import  to  know 
that  for  a  certain  clinician,  there  are  two  orders  of  inferior  intelli- 
gence, while  for  another  there  are  three  or  four;  that  is,  one  uses 
the  terms  complete  idiocy  and  incomplete  idiocy;  that  a  second 


20  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

proposes  the  new  terms  imbecile,  feeble-minded,  backward;  that 
a  third  distinguishes  the  non-social  from  the  non-teachable;  or 
again  that  one  has  established  the  difference  between  the  intel- 
lectual idiot  and  the  moral  idiot.  All  this  is  merely  terminology. 
Questions  of  terminology  are  doubtless  very  important,  but  only 
on  condition  that  there  be  unity  of  acceptance  of  the  facts  and  the 
ideas  which  the  terms  indicate.  But  it  seems  to  us  that  all  the 
classifications  of  the  authors  cited  above  have  the  same  lack  of 
precision,  a  fault  which  consists  essentially  in  this :  the  symptoms 
characterizing  the  different  degrees  of  mental  inferiority  are  not 
described  in  such  a  way  that  they  can  be  practically  recognized 
and  distinguished.  In  order  to  justify  our  remarks  it  will  suffice 
to  cite  some  of  the  best  known  of  these  classifications. 

Dr.  Jules  Voisin,  in  his  Lessons  on  Idiocy,  proposes  a  classifica- 
tion which  places  under  the  title  of  idiots  all  degrees  of  intellec- 
tual weakness;  it  is  one  of  the  simplest  and  best  that  has  been 
formulated: 

I.  Complete  idiocy,  absolute,  congenital  or  acquired,  composed  of  two 
degrees. 

(a)  The  anencephalics,  and  those  who  have  not  even  the  instinct  of 
self-preservation. 

(6)  These  who  have  the  instinct  of  self-preservation  and  certain  char- 
acteristics.    These  two  degrees  are  'incurable. 

II.  Incomplete  idiocy,  congenital  or  acquired,  which  also  includes  sev- 
eral degrees,  according  to  the  presence,  the  absence,  and  the  development 
of  certain  intellectual  faculties,  sensory  or  motor.  It  is  susceptible  of 
amelioration. 

III.  Imbecility,  congenital  or  acquired:  the  presence  in  rudimentary 
form  of  all  the  intellectual,  instinctive  and  moral  faculties;  perversion 
or  instability  of  these  faculties. 

IV.  Mental  debility,  characterized  by  the  weakness  or  by  the  lack 
of  balance  of  the  faculties.  It  is  now  the  motor  centers,  now  the  centers 
of  sensation,  now  the  emotional  centers  which  have  the  supremacy  in  the 
excitation.  When  one  of  these  centers  predominates  without  being  coun- 
terbalanced by  the  others,  the  result  is  either  a  "moteur"  or  a  "sensoriel," 
or  a  "sensitif." 

We  also  give  the  classification  of  Dr.  Bourneville,  one  of  the 
last  that  has  been  published.  It  appeared  in  the  Treatise  on 
Medicine  by  Brouardel  and  Gilbert. 

I.  Idiocy,  complete,  absolute,  or  of  the  first  degree:  comprises  purely  vege- 
tative beings  without  control  over  excretory  organs. and  without  any  in- 
tellectual manifestations. 


NECESSITY   FOR   SCIENTIFIC   DIAGNOSIS  21 

II.  Profound  idiocy,  or  idiocy  of  the  second  degree.  Life  here  is  essentially 
vegetative,  and  the  ideas  of  relationships  very  limited.  There  is  a  gleam 
of  intelligence,  a  fugitive  attention.  Motility,  locomotion  and  prehen- 
sion exist  to  a  limited  extent.  Appetite  is  exaggerated.  Inability  to 
retain  secretions  still  absolute. 

III.  Imbecility  proper;  the  intellectual  faculties  are  very  incomplete. 
Attention  fleeting  ("fugace")-  Perversion  of  instincts.  Defective  speech, 
limited  language.  Will  without  energy.  These  creatures  are  victims  of 
every  influence. 

IV.  Slight  imbecility  or  intellectual  retardation.  The  intellectual  facul- 
ties are  retarded,  and  noticeably  below  the  faculties  of  children  of  the 
same  age.  The  attention  may  remain  fixed,  at  least  for  a  certain  time. 
Movements,  locomotion,  prehension,  and  sensitiveness  are  generally  in- 
tact. The  stigmata  of  degeneracy  are  generally  less  numerous,  and  less 
pronounced  than  with  imbeciles  arid  especially  with  idiots. 

V.  Mental  instability.  Sometimes  simple,  but  more  often  approach- 
ing imbecility,  intellectual  backwardness.  Exuberant  physical  mobility, 
and  intellectual  mobility.     Sudden  impulses. 

VI.  Moral  imbecility.  Nightmares,  tempers,  instability  and  perver- 
sion of  instincts.  Excessive  credulity  toward  those  to  whom  these  chil- 
dren abandon  themselves,  and  who  dominate  them.  Egotism.  A  sexual 
development  beyond  their  age,  or  sexual  impulses  which  render  them 
dangerous.  Their  intellectual  faculties  may  be  absolutely  intact;  intel- 
lectual defect  is  only  a  secondary  characteristic.  Stigmata  of  physical 
degeneracy  are  sometimes  quite  absent. 

Let  us  see  some  of  the  principal  observations  that  can  be  made 
relative  to  these  classifications;  they  will  bear  upon  the  enumera- 
tion of  the  symptoms  and  their  definition. 

Enumeration  of  symptoms.  The  authors  incorporate  into  their 
definitions  a  great  number  of  motor  troubles  and  disorders  of 
every  sort,  belonging  to  the  digestive  and  secretive  apparatus, 
growth,  etc.  This  enumeration  would  be  in  place  in  a  clinical 
record,  where  all  the  observable  symptoms  of  a  patient  are  col- 
lected; but  it  has  this  disadvantage  that  it  misleads  the  mind, 
when  one  attempts  a  definition  where  only  the  essential  should  be 
noted.  Thus  we  see  the  authors  laying  great  stress  upon  motility, 
locomotion,  prehension  and  speech  in  distinguishing  the  different 
degrees  of  idiocy.  We  admit,  that  one  frequently  observes  motor 
troubles  with  idiots,  and  that  in  a  general  way,  the  intensity  of 
these  troubles  is  greater  in  the  most  profound  cases  of  idiocy. 
This  is  not  surprising.  From  the  moment  that  idiocy  is  admitted 
to  be  the  result  of  a  number  of  very  different  diseases  of  the  brain, 
it  is  logical  to  infer  that  the  diseases  which  produce  an  arrested 


22  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

or  perverted  development  in  the  intellectual  functions  should  also 
provoke  divers  disorders  in  the  sphere  of  motility;  as  for  instance 
in  the  respiratory,  circulatory,  secretory  functions,  since  all  the 
functions  of  the  living  being  are  directly  or  indirectly  under  the 
influence  of  the  nervous  system.  But  it  is  no  less  necessary  to 
establish  in  the  definition  of  idiocy,  a  distinction  between  it  and 
troubles  of  a  different  nature.  Idiocy,  as  Esquirol  was  the  first  to 
recognize,  consists  in  a  weakness  of  the  intelligence.  If  the 
physician  gives  a  child  the  diagnosis  of  profound  idiocy  or  of  im- 
becility, it  is  not  because  the  child  does  not  walk,  nor  talk,  has  no 
control  over  secretions,  is  microcephalic,  has  the  ears  badly  formed, 
or  the  palate  keeled.  The  child  is  judged  to  be  an  idiot  because 
he  is  affected  in  his  intellectual  development.  This  is  so  strikingly 
true  that  if  we  suppose  a  case  presented  to  us  where  speech,  loco- 
motion, prehension  were  all  nil,  but  which  gave  evidence  of  an 
intact  intelligence,  no  one  would  consider  that  patient  an  idiot. 
It  results  from  these  observations  that  the  directing  principle  of 

^  the  preceding  classifications  does  not  seem  to  us  correct.  The 
view  is  lost  that  here  it  is  a  question  of  inferior  states  of  intelli- 
gence, and  that  it  is  only  by  taking  into  account  this  inferiority 

^  that  a  classification  can  be  established.  In  other  words  a  classi- 
fication of  idiocy  is  a  clinical  classification  to  he  made  by  means  of 
psychology. 

Our  conception  would  be  badly  understood  if  it  were  supposed 
that  we  intend  to  eliminate  from  the  definition  of  idiocy  all  the 
purely  somatic  disorders  so  frequently  observed  in  these  unhappy 
cases.  On  the  contrary  it  is  very  useful  to  take  note  of  these 
symptoms,  'especially  in  cases  where  by  their  nature  or  their 
mechanism  they  reveal  to  us  a  mental  weakness  or  insufficiency. 
They  have  less  value  in  themselves  than  in  what  they  imply. 
Hence  the  necessity  for  their  analysis.  Take  for  example  a  child 
of  five  years  who  does  not  walk.  The  retardation  in  locomotion 
is  not  in  itself  a  sign  of  idiocy,  since  it  might  come  from  a  great 
number  of  anatomical  or  pathological  causes  which  are  quite  inde- 
pendent of  the  functioning  of  the  intelligence,  for  example.  Little's 
disease,  or  infantile  paralysis.  The  motihty  of  the  lower  mem- 
bers must  first  be  examined  to  see  if  it  is  normal  and  if  the  mem- 
bers are  strong  enough  to  bear  the  weight  of  the  child  and  if  that 
which  is  lacking  is  only  the  psychical  factor  of  locomotion,  that  is  to 
say  the  desire,  the  will  to  walk  and  the  intelligent  coordination  of 


NECESSITY   FOR   SCIENTIFIC   DIAGNOSIS  23 

the  movements  of  the  two  limbs.  The  same  analysis  must  be  made 
in  relation  to  the  inability  to  retain  secretions,  and  in  a  general 
manner  to  all  troubles  belonging  to  the  sphere  of  motility,  hold- 
ing firmly  in  mind  the  idea  that  the  physical  disorders  of  idiocy 
have  no  value  except  as  signs  which  reveal  the  intelligence. 

The  second  criticism  to  the  preceding  classifications,  which  is 
more  serious  than  the  first,  has  to  do  with  the  gradation  of  the 
symptoms.  After  one  has  perused  the  formulas  which  the  alien- 
ists employ,  he  perceives  that  very  little  has  been  learned,  because 
of  their  extreme  vagueness.  They  are  merely  differences  of  more 
or  less  which  are  pointed  out,  and  these  differences,  which  are  de- 
dared  sufficient  to  establish  the  degrees,  and  consequently  diag- 
nostic differences,  are  not  defined  at  all. 

We  are  told  for  profound  idiocy:  ''  There  is  here  a  fugitive  atten- 
tion.^' What  is  that — a  fugitive  attention?  In  what  does  it 
consist?  '^Motility  exists  hut  a  little."  What  does  ''little'^  sig- 
nify? We  are  assured  that  imbecility  differs  from  idiocy  in  this: 
in  idiocy  ^' there  is  a  gleam  of  intelligence;"  in  imbecility  ''the  in- 
tellectual faculties  exist  in  a  very  incomplete  degree."  We  should 
like  to  know  what  difference  must  be  established  between  ''a, 
gleam"  of  intelligence  and  ''very  incomplete  degree"  of  the  intel- 
lectual faculties.  We  are  again  informed  that  in  profound  idiocy 
''the  attention  is  fugitive"  while  in  imbecihty,  "the  attention  is 
fleeting."  We  are  unable  to  grasp  the  distinctive  shade  of  mean- 
ing. We  are  also  ignorant  of  the  value  of  the  following  symptoms 
which  are  noted  in  the  definition  of  imbecility,  "defective  speech" 
"limited  language."  We  admit  that  we  have  no  idea  what  pre- 
cise defect  of  articulation  corresponds  to  ''defective  speech." 
There  are  people  who  stammer  slightly,  and  others  whose  speech 
is  scarcely  intelligible.  All  have  defective  speech.  The  same 
remark  is  true  for  "limited  language."  Very  many  peasants  have 
a  limited  language.  What  extent  of  vocabulary  must  one  possess 
in  order  to  have  a  "limited  language?"  Again  we  are  told  for  the 
diagnosis  of  imbecility  "Will  without  energy."  These  are  still  the 
same  kind  of  expressions  so  vague  that  they  might  be  apphed  even 
to  normals.  What  shall  we  say  of  the  formula  for  "slight  im- 
becility"— with  which  we  shall  close.  ".  .  .  .  the  intellectual 
faculties  ....  are  noticeably  below  the  faculties  of  children  of 
the  same  age."  "Noticeably"  is  the  word  which  forms  the  best 
resume  of  the  essential  character  of  these  classifications. 


24  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

Even  Esquirol  himself  merits  the  same  criticism  when  he  dis- 
tinguishes idiocy  from  imbecihty,  in  writing  extraordinary  phrases 
like  the  following:  ''with  imbeciles  the  organization  is  more  or  less 
perfect,"  ''with  idiots  the  senses  are  scarcely  outlined — the  organiza- 
tion is  incomplete,  etc.''  Evidently  Esquirol  has  set  a  bad  example 
and  everyone  has  followed  him. 

We  were  therefore  right  in  saying  as  we  did,  that  it  is  a  fixed 
basis  of  differential  diagnosis  which  is  lacking  with  the  alienists. 
The  vagueness  of  their  formulas  reveals  the  vagueness  of  their 
ideas.  They  cling  to  characteristics  which  are  by  "more  or  less," 
and  they  permit  themselves  to  be  guided  by  a  subjective  impres- 
sion which  they  do  not  seem  to  think  necessary  to  analyze,  and 
which  therefore  would  be  impossible  to  justify.  We  shall  never 
be  able  to  emphasize  sufficiently  how  far  removed  from  scientific 
methods  are  such  empirical  processes.  Quantitative  differences, 
such  as  we  have  noted,  are  of  no  value  unless  they  are  measured,  even 
if  measured  but  crudely. 

In  spite  of  these  objections  we  wilhngly  recognize  that  alienists, 
because  of  their  practice  and  their  medical  insight,  arrive  very 
quickly  at  judging  and  classifying  a  child.  But  these  judgments 
and  these  classifications  are  made  by  subjective  processes,  and  no 
ahenist  would  be  able  to  tell  with  precision,  for  example,  how 
many  years  a  certain  backward  child  was  behind  a  normal  one  of 
the  same  age.  The  distinction  between  slight  mental  defect  and 
normality,  which  is  so  difficult  to  trace  and  yet  so  interesting,  re- 
mains therefore  completely  inaccessible. 

Following  the  symptomatic  classifications,  we  find  another  type, 
that  of  psychological  classifications. 

In  these,  less  attention  is  paid  to  somatic  symptoms,  while  the 
interest  is  concentrated  on  the  degree  of  intelligence.  The  idea  is 
quite  recent.  Nevertheless  it  would  seem  that  it  already  existed 
in  Seguin's  book.  In  that  singular  work,  so  remarkable  as  a 
practitioner's,  so  weak  as  a  theorist's,  we  find  the  extraordinary 
idea  that  idiocy  depends  on  a  weakness  of  the  will.  The  idiot 
would  not  be  an  idiot,  if  he  did  not  wish  to  be  one.  It  is  useless  to 
stop  to  discuss  this  absurd  statement,  to  which  several  authors — 
those  at  least  who  have  had  the  patience  to  read  the  work  of 
Seguin^ — have  given  due  justice.    We  have  pointed  out  this  error, 

*  E.  Seguin,  Traitement  moral,  hygihne  et  Education  des  idiots  et  des  autres 
enfants  arri6res,  Paris,  J.-B.  Bailli^re,  1846,  p.  170. 


NECESSITY   FOR   SCIENTIFIC   DIAGNOSIS  25 

because  Seguin  seemed  to  grasp,  very  vaguely  it  is  true,  that  it  is 
by  psychological  study  that  idiots  must  be  classified.  We  shall 
not  lay  stress  upon  this. 

P.  SolUer^  was  the  first  to  propose  a  psychological  classification, 
the  fir st7  in  reality,  who  attempted  to  establish  a  classification  of 
the  degrees  of  idiocy  based  on  a  single  psychological  characteristic. 
That  characteristic  is  the  state  of  the  attention.  The  author, 
having  formulated  this  principle,  deduces  schematically  the  fol- 
lowing division: 

Absolute  idiocy,  characterized  by  the  absolute  and  complete  absence  of 
attention. 

Simple  idiocy,  in  which  there  is  weakness  or  difficulty  of  attention. 
Imbecility,  in  which  there  is  instability  of  attention. 

This  curious  attempt  seems  to  us  to  be  rightly  directed  because 
it  is  essentially  psychological.  It  is  by  a  mental  quality  alone 
that  Sollier  attempts  to  distinguish  idiots.  Perhaps,  however,  he 
did  not  himself  reaUze  the  value  of  the  principle  which  directed 
him,  because  he  continued  to  reproduce  the  definition  of  his  prede- 
cessors according  to  whom  idiocy  is  ''an  affection  of  the  brain 
.  .  .  .  characterized  by  trouble  with  the  intellectual,  sen- 
sory and  motor  functions."  The  expression  "motor"  which  he 
uses  seems  to  prove  that,  in  his  thought,  idiocy  is  not  exclusively 
a  mental  infirmity.  As  to  the  intellectual  faculty  by  which  SoUier 
chose  to  distinguish  different  kinds  of  idiots,  he  has  made  an  un- 
happy selection.  Why  should  he  have  chosen  attention  before 
memory,  or  imagination,  or  comprehension,  or  judgment?  This 
has  very  truly  the  appearance  of  the  a  priori  system.  A  distinc- 
tion of  this  nature  ought  to  be  made  only  from  observations  taken 
from  life.  The  intellectual  functions  which  are  the  first  to  de- 
velop should  be  sought  out,  how  they  arrange  themselves,  in  what 
order  they  appear,  how  they  coordinate.  This  is  the  true,  the 
only  method.  To  be  sure  this  is  laborious  enough;  very  many 
patients  must  be  examined,  and  when  one  is  willing  to  analyze 
concrete  facts,  he  seldom  arrives  at  conclusions  that  can  be  ele- 
gantly expressed  in  so  brief  a  formula.  These  brief  formulas  be- 
long to  hterature.  The  classification  of  Sollier  is  more  hterary 
than  clinical. 

*  Psychologic  de  Vidiot  et  de  I'imbicile,  Paris,  Alcan,  p.  36. 


26  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

We  see  very  easily,  nevertheless,  how  the  idea  came  to  him  of 
making  attention  the  key  to  idiocy.  Ribot,  who  recently  pub- 
lished an  important  monograph  entitled,  ''Psychology  of  Atten- 
tion,'' obeyed  that  quite  natural  tendency  among  authors  of  mon- 
ographs, to  exaggerate  the  importance  of  his  subject;  he  insisted 
especially  on  the  comparison  between  spontaneous  and  voluntary 
attention,  concluding  that  the  spontaneous  form,  which  is  the 
primitive,  is  more  important  than  the  other.  SolHer,  impressed 
with  this  argument,  which  is  true  only  in  general  psychology, 
transported  it  to  the  cUnic,  that  is  to  say,  into  individual  psychol- 
ogy, where  it  is  probably  false,  because  individuals  seem  to  differ, 
not  so  much  by  the  degree  of  spontaneous  attention,  as  by  the 
degree  of  voluntary  or  dehberate  attention.  And  Sollier  has  once 
more  followed  this  preconceived  idea,  when  he  supposes  that  at- 
tention, because  it  is  the  most  important  of  the  faculties  of  mind 
(which,  by  the  way,  is  subject  to  question),  presents  necessarily  a 
development  parallel  to  that  of  all  the  intellectual  faculties,  and 
that  its  measure  will,  therefore,  serve  as  the  measure  of  the  intel- 
ligence. Different  observers,  Voisin^  for  example,  have  cited 
interesting  facts  which  go  to  prove  the  contrary. 

And  now  a  last  objection,  Sollier  does  not  indicate  by  what  signs 
one  can  recognize  the  weakness,  the  difficulty,  the  instability  of 
the  attention,  nor  how  one  can  measure  this  so  as  to  make  a  diag- 
nosis. He  contents  himself  in  his  chapter  on  attention  with  a 
general  and  rather  vague  description  in  which  he  makes  numerous 
citations  from  Ribot,  but  in  which  one  searches  in  vain  for  precise 
observations  upon  idiots  or  imbeciles.  The  author  remains  in  the 
realm  of  general  ideas  for  which  his  mind  has  an  evident  predilec- 
tion; he  never  touches  ground,  never  cites  a  fact.  A  character- 
istic sign  of  this  manner  is  to  speak  of  "the  idiot"  and  "the  im- 
becile," and  to  describe  the  states  of  attention  of  these  abstract 
entities.  We  think  it  worth  while  to  cite  several  passages  which 
illustrate  how  the  author  has  grasped  his  subject. 

Here  is  a  passage  in  which  he  describes  the  attention  of  an  idiot: 

With  the  absolute  idiot  the  attention  is  reduced  to  its  simplest  mani- 
festation, one  can  almost  say  it  does  not  exist.  At  times  only  the  sight  of 
nourishment  can  make  him  lose  his  indifference.  Sometimes  by  surpris- 
ing him,  one  may  catch  a  gleam  of  passing  attention,  which  vanishes  even 

'  Legons  sur  Vdiotiey  p.  80. 


NECESSITY   FOR   SCIENTIFIC   DIAGNOSIS  27 

more  quickly  than  it  appeared.  ^  On  hearing  a  loud  harsh  noise  for  in- 
stance, the  idiot  turns  about  or  simply  turns  his  eyes,  then  falls  into  the 
habitual  impassiveness  from  which  nothing  can  arouse  him.  He  has 
no  ideas,  no  perception,  scarcely  any  sensations.  With  the  simple  idiot 
it  is  often  difficult  to  arouse  the  attention  of  which  the  subject  is  capable, 
and  it  is  necessary  to  resort  to  every  expedient  which  pedagogy  can  fur- 
nish— such  as  for  instance,  pictures  and  colors.  Idiots  seem  to  be  especi- 
ally visualists.  The  attention  of  the  imbecile  is  primarily,  wandering. 
With  the  greatest  facility,  it  passes  from  one  subject  to  another,  with  no 
connection  between  the  statements.  While  still  young,  when  questioned, 
he  will  let  his  gaze  wander,  will  handle  objects  about  him,  and  make  no 
reply  until  after  you  have  repeated  the  same  question  many  times. 
Scarcely  has  he  replied  by  a  few  words  uttered  without  thought,  before 
he  recommences  his  manoeuvres  or  ^ets  to  babbling  or  to  singing.  He  will 
keep  repeating  that  which  is  said  to  him  of  serious  matters  which  in  pass- 
ing have  caught  his  voluntary  attention. 

These  few  instances  show  that  the  author  has  observed  many 
idiots,  and  that  he  has  famiharized  himself  with  their  physiognomy 
their  gestures,  their  manners.  There  are  very  many  interesting 
facts  in  these  rather  vague  descriptions.  But  the  practitioner 
who  would  take  such  descriptions  as  a  final  guide  in  classifying 
idiots,  would  be  very  much  hampered.  That  which  he  would 
need  and  which  SoUier  does  not  give,  is  a  technique  capable  of 
measuring  the  degrees  of  attention  and  of  recording  the  quanti- 
tative variations.  We  cannot,  however,  reproach  SolUer  for 
having  made  this  important  omission  in  his  book.  Methods  of 
measuring  attention  are  still  scarcely  known;  this  is  one  of  the  least 
advanced  branches  of  experimental  psychology. 

It  is  unnecessary  to  add  that  in  spite  of  these  criticisms,  the 
work  of  Sollier^  presents  the  greatest  interest. 

We  would  note  as  very  curious,  the  distinction  which  he  majies 
between  ''distraction  dissipated'^  and  ''distraction  absorbed." 
We  shall  return  to  this  point  at  another  time  when  we  study  the 
attention  of  the  feeble-minded. 

In  closing  this  history  we  wish  to  speak  of  a  recent  experiment, 
scarcely  a  year  old,  due  to  the  efforts  of  Dr.  Blin  and  his  pupil, 

8  Let  us  emphasize  in  passing  that  interesting  expression,  whose  end 
is  only  verbalism;  verbalism  is  the  peril  of  generalizers. 

^  This  author  proposes  another  distinction,  limited  to  idiocy  and  im- 
becility. Idiocy  would  be  due  to  certain  lesions,  while  in  imbecility  there 
would  be  no  lesions.  Although  scarcely  practical,  this  distinction  would 
be  very  curious,  if  it  could  be  demonstrated  to  be  true.  Unfortunately, 
the  author  does  not  insist  upon  the  demonstration. 


28  DEVELOPMENT   OF    INTELLIGENCE 

Dr.  Damaye.  It  has  been  explained  by  Dr.  Blin,  in  a  short  article 
upon  mental  weaknesses.  Dr.  Damaye  has  shown  in  detail  in  a 
thesis  how  the  method  of  examination,  conceived  by  his  master, 
can  be  appHed  to  patients;  this  thesis  contains  an  account,  un- 
fortunately rather  brief,  but  very  interesting,  of  the  attempt  to 
apply  it  to  250  idiots,  imbeciles,  and  morons  of  the  Vaucluse 
Colony.  We  have  not  therefore  to  judge  of  a  purely  theoretical 
idea,  but  of  a  method  which  has  really  been  applied. 

Before  entering  on  its  exposition,  let  us  say  that  in  precision 
Dr.  Blin's  study  seems  to  us  superior  to  anything  previously  ac- 
comphshed.  The  criticisms  which  we  shall  make  will  not  cause  us 
to  forget  that  we  have  here  a  first  attempt  to  apply  a  scientific 
method  to  the  diagnosis  of  mental  debility. 

The  method  consists  of  a  pre-arranged  list  of  questions  which 
are  given  to  all  in  such  a  way  that,  if  repeated  by  different  per- 
sons on  the  same  individual,  constantly  identical  results  will  be 
obtained.  The  examination  is  composed  of  a  series  of  twenty 
topics.  A  certain  number  of  questions,  graded  in  several  of  the 
series  according  to  their  difficulty,  are  prepared  upon  each  of  these 
topics. 

The  enumeration  of  these  topics  will  sufficiently  indicate  the 
variety  that  has  been  attempted  in  order  to  explore  in  a  short  time 
a  field  of  knowledge  as  vast  as  possible.  We  reproduce  here  not 
only  the  list  of  these  twenty  topics  but  also  the  different  ques- 
tions which  are  asked  apropos  of  each. 

I.  Personal  Habits 

Bearing.  Appearance.  Cleanliness  of  body  and  clothing.  (Vest 
unbuttoned,  cravat  untied,  etc.) 

II.  Speech 

Possibility  of  emitting  sounds.  Articulation  of  sounds.  Rudimentary 
language.  Fluent  language.  As  a  standard  one  might  cause  to  be  pro- 
nounced the  words,  artillery,  artilleryman,  polytechnic,  constitutional, 
unconstitutionally. 

III.  Name 

What  is  your  name?  Where  do  you  live? 

How  old  are  you?  Date  of  birth. 

What  are  your  given  names?  Place  of  birth. 

In  what  year  were  you  born?  The  department. 


NECESSITY   FOR   SCIENTIFIC   DIAGNOSIS 


29 


IV.  Parents 


Are  your  parents  living? 

What  do  they  do? 

Have  you  brothers? 

How  many? 

Have  you  sisters? 

How  many? 

What  are  your  brothers'  names? 

And  your  sisters'? 

Are  your  brothers  older  than  you? 


Are  your  sisters  older  than  you? 

How  old  are  they? 

What  is  your  father's  first  name? 

What  is  your  mother's? 

Where  does  your  father  work? 

And  your  mother? 

Where  was  your  father  born? 

Where  was  your  mother  born? 


V.  Ideas  of  Age 


Are  you  young  or  old? 
When  will  you  be  a  man? 
At  what  age  is  one  a  man? 
At  what  age  is  one  a  soldier? 


Are  your  father  and  mother  old  or 

young? 
How  old  are  they? 
How  do  you  know  when  one  is  old? 


VI.  Knowledge  of  the  Body 


Show  me  your  hands. 
Put  out  your  tongue. 
What  do  you  call  the  place  that  I 

am  touching  (cheek)? 
Where  is  your  foot? 
Where  is  your  leg? 
Your  thigh? 
Your  shoulder? 
Where  are  your  lips? 


Close  your  eyes. 

Put  your  finger  on  your  right  ear. 

Your  gums?  , 

Your  eyelids? 

Your  eyebrows? 

Your  forearm? 

Where  is  your  stomach? 

Where  is  your  brain? 

Close  your  right  eyelid. 


VII.  Movements 


Sit  down. 

Turn  around. 

Go  to  the  wall  and  return. 

Raise  your  arms. 

Put  you  finger  on  your  right  ear. 

Cross  your  arms. 

Turn  up  your  pantaloons. 

Take  off  your  jacket  as  quickly  as 

possible  and  put  it  on  as  quickly 

as  possible. 


Thread  a  needle  with  a  woolen 
thread. 

Try  to  make  some  little  stitches. 

Sit  on  the  floor,  cross  your  arms, 
and  rise  with  arms  crossed. 

Turn  down  your  pantaloons  with- 
out sitting  down. 


30 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 


VIII.  Ideas  About  Objects 
The  child  is  shown  different  objects  which  he  should  name. 


Key. 

Pin. 

Pencil. 

Book. 

Photograph. 

Compass. 

Cross-ruled  paper. 

Table  cloth. 


Sponge. 

Of  what  use  is  a  pin? 

Of  what  color  is  this  pencil? 

Of  what  color  is  mine? 

Of  what  can  a  book  cover  be  made? 

What  is  a  photograph? 

What  can  it  represent? 


IX.  Internal  Sensations 
Did  you  enjoy  your  breakfast  this 


morning? 

Did  you  sleep  well? 

Are  you  thirsty? 

Is  your  appetite  ordinarily  good? 

What  time  of  the  day  are  you  hun- 
griest? 

Are  you  often  thirsty? 


Are  you  less  thirsty  in  summer  than 

in  winter? 
Are  you  less  thirsty  when  it  is  hot 

than  when  it  is  cold? 
You  are  never  thirsty,  are  you? 
You  are  never  hungry? 
What  did  you  dream  last  night? 
What  is  a  dream? 
Do  you  often  dream? 


X.  Ideas  of  Time 


Have  you  been  here  long? 
What  time  is  it? 
Is  a  day  longer  than  a  week? 
Is  a  week  longer  than  a  month? 
How  many  hours  are  there  in  a  day? 
How   many   days    are    there    in    a 

month? 
How  many  months  are  there  in  a 

year? 
Is  a  month  longer  than  a  year? 
When  you  get  up  tomorrow  will  it 

be  morning  or  evening? 
What  day  is  this? 
How  many  days  ago  did  you  come? 


How  many   days   is   it   since   you 

saw  your  parents? 
That  makes  how  many  days  that 

you  have  been  going  to  school? 
And  day  after  tomorrow? 
And  yesterday? 
At  what  hour  do  you  rise  in  the 

morning? 
How  many  days  are  there  in  a  year? 
How  many  weeks  are  there  in  a 

year? 
What  season  is  this? 
When  is  it  winter? 
And  summer? 


Where  are  you  now? 

Where  were  you  before  coming  here? 

Are  we  far  from  Paris? 

Where  in  Paris  do  you  live? 

Is  it  far  from  the  Seine?  (One 
might  ask  the  child  at  this  point 
if  his  house  is  far  from  such  or 
such   a   street   or   monument   in 


XI.  Ideas  of  Place 

order  thoroughly  to  explore  his 


ideas  of  place.) 
In  what  ward  of  the  city  do  your 

parents  live? 
In  what  department  are  we? 
What  is  the  principal  city  of  this 

department. 


NECESSITY  FOR   SCIENTIFIC  DIAGNOSIS 


31 


XII.  Patriotic  Ideas 


From  what  country  are  you? 

Are  you  French? 

Were  your  father  and  mother  born 

in  France? 
Are    there    other    countries    than 

France? 
What  are  they? 


Would  you  rather  belong  to  another 
country  than  to  France? 

Why  do  you  prefer  to  be  French? 

Do  you  know  what  it  is  that  one 
calls  his  country? 

Why  should  one  love  his  country? 

Is  Brittany  in  France? 

And  Normandy? 


XIII.  Military  Service 


Would  you  like  to  be  a  soldier? 

Was  your  father  a  soldier? 

Did  he  ride  a  horse? 

What    do    soldiers    wear    on    their 

heads? 
What  do  you  call  the  soldiers  who 

have  the  cannon? 


What  soldiers  ride  horses? 

If  you  were  a  soldier  would  you 

like  better  to  fight  on  foot  or  on 

horse-back? 
What  is  an  officer? 
What  has  the  officer  on  his  sleeves? 
What  officer  has  the  highest  rank? 


XIV.  Reading 

XV.  Writing 

Mistakes  in  spelling  of  course  make  the  score  less  according  to  their 
gravity  and  the  age  of  the  child. 

XVI.  Calculation 

The  child  is  questioned  upon  the  four  operations  of  arithmetic. 

XVII.  Drawing 

We  have  adopted  the  following  models — a  square,  and  three  varieties 
of  rectangular  parallelograms — which  the  child  must  reproduce  with  the 
pen,  to  which  we  have  added  three  lines  of  varying  lengths. 

XVIII.  Trades 

What  trade  does  your  father  follow?  What  are  they? 

Is  it  a  good  trade?                      .  What    is    the    difference    between 

What  is  a  trade?  the  Catholic  religion  and  Prot- 

What  does  the  baker  do?  estant  religion? 

Are    there    other    religions    than  Between  the  Catholic  religion  and 

yours?  Jewish  religion? 

Here,  as  an  example,  is  part  of  the  examination  of  a  child. 

I.  The  boy  F of  nine  years,  comes  to  us  with  his  hands 

in  his  pockets,  face  and  hands  not  very  clean,  nails  bitten,  countenance 
of  little  intelligence.  =  2 


32  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

II.  Language  rudimentary  and  voice  slightly  nasal,  sometimes  unin- 
telligible.    He  pronounces  the  standard  words  badly.  =  2 

III.  What  is  your  name? — Edmond.  (Then  after  a  pause  he  gives 
his  family  name.) 

How  old  are  you? — Nine  years. 

What  are  your  given  names? — Emile,  Adolphe,  Edmond. 

In  what  year  were  you  born? — In  1802. 

What  month? — In  January  or  February. 

What  date?— The  9th. 

You  do  not  know  if  it  was  in  January  or  February? — No. 

In  what  country  were  you  born? — Paris. 

Where  do  your  parents  live?     (He  gave  the  name  of  the  street.) 

What  number? — No.  9. 

In  which  ward? — Ninth  (correct). 

In  which  department  of  France  is  it?     (Unintelligible  reply).  =  3 

IV.  Your  father  and  mother  are  living? — Yes. 

What  does  your  father  do? — He  is  employed  in  the  gas  company.  (The 
child  then  begins  to  cry). 

What  does  your  mother  do? — She  sews. 

At  home? — Yes. 

Have  you  brothers? — Yes.     I  have  four. 

What  are  their  names? — Jacques,  Yvonne,  and  Henriette.' 

You  have  only  three  then? — Yes. 

Have  you  sisters? — Two;  Marie,  Am^lie  and  then  my  Aunt  Petit. 

How  old  are  your  brothers? — Nine  years. 

And  your  sisters,  how  old  are  they? — I  never  asked  them;  I  was  not 
there. 

What  is  your  mother's  name? — (He  gives  the  family  name  of  his  mother.) 

But  her  given  name.  Is  it  Henrietta,  Jane? — No.  (He  repeats  the 
family  name  of  his  mother.)  My  father,  his  name  is  ...  .  (the 
child  gives  his  name  correctly). 

In  what  country  was  your  father  born? — At  ....  (unintelligible 
word). 

Where  was  your  mother  born? — In  Paris.  =  3 

V.  Are  you  young  or  old? — ^Young. 
When  is  one  old? — When  one  is  old. 

At  what  age? — At  nine  years.  My  mother  is  old.  My  grandfather  is 
dead. 

At  what  age  is  one  a  man? — A  man  is  always  at  least  four  years  old. 

At  what  age  does  one  become  a  soldier? — Papa,  he  was  a  soldier,  he 
was  a  military  man. 

Yes,  but  at  what  age?    .... 

You  do  not  know? — No. 

Is  your  father  young  or  old? — Young. 

How  old  is  he? — Five  years  old. 

And  your  mother? — She  is  nine  years  old. 


NECESSITY   FOR   SCIENTIFIC   DIAGNOSIS  33 

What  is  the  color  of  old  people's  hair? — Red. 

How  is  the  face  of  an  old  person? — Wrinkled.     My  mother  always  has 
pain  in  her  hands. 

How  does  one  walk  when  one  is  old? — Like  everybody  else. 
Can  old  people  run? — No. 

VI.  Put  out  your  tongue.  1  ^      , 
Close  your  eyes.  j 

Put  your  fingers  on  your  right  ear.     (He  puts  his  finger  on  his  left  ear.) 

What  do  you  call  the  place  (cheek)  that  I  am  touching? — Cheek. 

Where  is  your  heart?!  ^      , 

And  your  stomach?    j 

And  your  brain?     (He  points  to  his  neck.) 

Your  head?        \q     a 

Your  shoulder?/ 

Your  forearm?     (He  points  to  his  arm.) 

Your  lips?     1  p      , 

Your  gums?  j 

Your  eyelids?     (He  points  to  his  teeth.) 

Close  your  right  eyelid.     (He  shuts  his  eyes.) 

Where  is  your  foot?     (He  shows  his  leg.) 

Show  me  your  leg?l  ^      , 

Your  thigh.  j 

Take  off  your  jacket  as  quickly  as  possible.)  ^i        i  i 

T5  ,  - ,  .  1 ,  -ui  r  Passable.  . 

Put  it  on  as  quickly  as  possible.  J  =3 

VII.  Sit  down  here.l  ^  , 
^  .  >  Good. 
Raise  your  arm.        J 

Put  your  hands  on  your  head.     (He  places  but  one.) 

Both  of  them. 


>  Good. 


Cross  your  arms. 
Stand  up. 

Sit  down  on  the  ground. 

Cross  your  arms  and  get  up  with  your  arms  crossed.     (He  cannot  do  it.) 

He  threads  the  needle  and  turns  up  the  lower  edge  of  his  pantaloons 

satisfactorily.  =  4 

VIII.  The  child  recognizes  the  inkwell,  the  apron,  the  pencil,  the  sponge, 
the  pin,  and  table  cloth. 

What  is  the  color  of  this  pencil? — Yellow.     (It  is  red.) 

What  color  does  it  write? — Black.     (Correct.) 

What  is  this?     (cross-ruled  paper) — A  page. 

What  is  the  color  of  the  table  cloth? — White. 

What  do  you  do  with  a  key? — Open  the  door. 

What  do  you  do  with  a  pin? — Stick. 

What  do  you  stick? — Straws  to  hold  them  together. 

Do  you  know  what  a  compass  is? — No. 

You  never  saw  one? — No. 

Do  you  know  what  a  photograph  is? — Yes. 


34  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

What  is  it? — It  is  a  photograph  that  one  puts  little  babies  in. 
What  is  that  a  picture  of? — That  is  a  picture  of  a  little  baby. 
Can  a  photograph  represent  anything  one  wishes? — No.  =  3 

IX.  Did  you  breakfast  well  this  morning? — Yes. 
Did  you  sleep  well? — Yes  sir. 
Is  your  appetite  ordinarily  good? — Yes. 

What  time  of  the  day  are  you  the  hungriest? — At  11  o'clock. 
At  what  hour  are  you  the  thirstiest? — At  four  o'clock. 
Are  you  often  thirsty? — Yes. 

In  summer,  are  you  less  thirsty  than  in  winter? — Less  thirsty. 
When  it  is  hot  you  are  not  so  thirsty  as  when  it  is  cold? — Yes. 
Do  you  dream  when  you  sleep? — No  sir. 
Do  you  know  what  a  dream  is? — Yes. 
What  is  it? — It  is  to  waken  in  the  night. 

Of  whom  did  you  dream  last  night? — Of  mamma  (the  child  begins  to 
cry). 

Did  you  not  have  a  good  breakfast  this  morning? — Yes  sir. 
You  did  not  sleep  well? — No  sir. 

We  shall  not  insist  upon  minute  criticism  of  details.  There  are 
questions  that  seem  superfluous,  or  of  mere  erudition  (what  is  the 
chief  town  of  such  and  such  a  department) .  In  some  the  form  is 
unfortunate;  for  example  those  which  can  be  answered  by  yes  or 
nO;  because  such  repHes  do  not  sufficiently  prove  whether  the 
question  has  been  thoroughly  understood.  It  would  be  better  to 
turn  the  question  so  as  to  oblige  the  child  to  somewhat  develop 
his  thought  if  he  has  one.  But  these  are  trifles.  That  which  ap- 
pears to  us  in  most  need  of  criticism  is  the  method  employed  for 
grading  the  repUes.  The  marking  is  from  0  to  5.  How  is  it 
given?  It  is  given  by  the  total  of  the  replies  to  a  topic,  that  is  to 
say  according  to  the  bearing  of  at  least  4  rephes.  There  is  no 
special  mark  for  each  question.  The  examiner  ji^dges  and  esti- 
mates as  a  whole:  estimation  is  subjectively  made. 

The  first  note  is  of  the  more  or  less  intelligent  appearance  of  the 
face.^^  It  seems  that  for  the  others,  what  is  considered  especially 
is  the  more  or  less  intelligent  nature  of  the  replies.  It  is  again  a 
synthetic  impression.  It  seems  to  us  that  such  an  estimate  is 
rather  too  arbitrary.  By  this  means,  there  enters  into  the  exam- 
ination that  variable  element  which  one  so  justly  wishes  to  elimi- 
nate. When  a  questioner  marks  5  for  the  total  of  replies,  he  is 
not  certain  but  that  another  examiner  would  mark  4.     M.  Blin 

'     ^°  The  last,  of  the  attitude  during  the  entire  examination. 


NECESSITY   FOR    SCIENTIFIC   DIAGNOSIS  35 

and  M.  Damaye  could  have  made  some  control  experiments  by- 
asking  their  colleagues  to  suggest  markings  according  to  the  writ- 
ten replies  submitted  to  them. 

This  same  arbitrary  spirit  is  found  also  in  the  choice  of  topics. 
For  each  topic  the  same  mark  is  given,  thus  making  them  all  of 
equal  rank.  One  assumes  therefore  that  all  the  topics  present  the 
same  amount  of  difficulty ,  and  that  there  would  be  the  same  reward 
for  a  child  to  answer  all  the  questions  about  names  as  to  answer 
all  those  about  religion.  Again,  in  each  topic  the  gradation  of 
difficulty  seems  to  have  been  made  equally  arbitrarily;  that  is  to 
say,  it  would  appear  that  the  author  has  been  guided  by  his  own 
estimation.  Moreover,  one  has  -ihe  proof  in  the  fact,  that  the 
three  series  of  questions,  graded  according  to  their  difficulty,  (1) 
for  children  of  10  years,  (2)  from  10  to  13  years,  and  (3)  for  those 
above  13  years,  are  nevertheless  answered  with  the  maximum  of 
points  by  children  of  from  7  to  8  years.  It  is  the  same  error  that 
we  encounter  throughout.  Consequently,  the  whole  system  con- 
stitutes a  scale  established  a  priori.  It  is  possible,  and  we  very 
willingly  believe  that  in  attempting  the  application  it  has  been 
found  necessary  to  mend  the  system,  to  correct  it  in  certain  points, 
so  that  it  may  harmonize  better  with  practice.  But  whatever 
may  be  the  importance  of  these  corrections  of  detail,  they  do  not 
in  the  least  take  away  the  schematic  character  of  the  plan  which 
seems  to  us  to  have  sprung  fully  armed  from  the  brain  of  a 
theorist. 

Here  then  is  what  seems  to  us  the  chief  defect  of  this  method  of 
examination.  Notwithstanding  this  defect,  in  practice  it  must 
necessarily  render  a  real  service,  because  it  creates  difficulties 
which  all  pupils  cannot  successfully  master,  and  consequently 
permits  us  to  make  a  selection  among  them.  Therefore  it  is  small 
matter  that  other  tests  of  intelligence  might  bring  about  the  same 
result.  Small  matter  that  the  themes  of  others  give  a  result  on 
the  whole  nearly  the  same.  When  one  has  given  examinations 
he  sees  that.  And  the  method  of  M.  Blin,  fundamentally,  is 
only  an  examination  for  scholarship,  a  new  bachelor's  degree, 
or  a  new  certificate  of  studies,  with  this  advantage  we  admit, 
of  being  a  test,  whose  questions,  fixed  in  advance,  do  not  suffer 
from  the  bad  humor  or  the  bad  digestion  of  the  examiner. 

Consequently  there  is  no  room  for  surprise,  if  we  do  not  find  in 
this  collection  of  questions,  any  idea  upon  the  gradation  of  intel- 


36  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

ligence.  The  child  who  has  passed  through  this  roUing  mill  comes 
before  us  with  a  certain  total  of  marks,  36  for  instance,  or  70.  We 
understand  that  70  is  nearer  normal  than  36  and  that  is  all.  We 
have  no  precise  notion  of  the  mental  level  of  these  candidates,  no 
notion  of  what  they  can  or  cannot  do.  Did  the  one  who  obtained 
36  have  any  comprehension  of  abstract  ideas?  We  do  not  know, 
and  cannot  divine.  How  much  is  he  behind  normal  children  of 
the  same  age?    We  know  this  no  better. 

This  brings  us  very  naturally  to  an  exposition  of  the  plan  of  our 
work.  It  will  be  seen  that  our  directing  idea  is  different  from 
that  of  M.  Blin  although  our  system  of  measurement,  hke  his,  is 
essentially  psychological. 

A.  BiNET  AND  Th.  Simon. 


NEW  METHODS   FOR   THE   DIAGNOSIS   OF  THE 
INTELLECTUAL  LEVEL  OF  SUBNORMALS 

UAnnee  Psychologique,  1905,  Vol.  XII,  pp.  191-244 

Before  explaining  these  methods  let  us  recall  exactly  the  condi- 
tions of  the  problem  which  we  are  attempting  to  solve.  Our  pur- 
pose is  to  be  able  to  measure  the  intellectual  capacity  of  a  child 
who  is  brought  to  us  in  order  to  know  whether  he  is  normal  or 
retarded.  We  should  therefore,  study  his  condition  at  the  time  and 
that  only,  ^f We  have  nothing  to  do  either  with  his  past  history  or 
with  his  future;  consequently  we  shall  neglect  his  etiology,  and 
we  shall  make  no  attempt  to  distinguish  between  acquired  and 
congenital  idiocy;  for  a  stronger  reason  we  shall  set  aside  all  consid- 
eration of  pathological  anatomy  which  might  explain  his  intel- 
lectual deficiency.  So  much  for  his  past.  As  to  that  which  con- 
cerns his  future,  we  shall  exercise  the  same  abstinence;  we  do  not 
attempt  to  establish  or  prepare  a  prognosis  and  we  leave  unan- 
swered the  question  of  whether  this  retardation  is  curable,  or  even 
improvable.  We  shall  limit  ourselves  to  ascertaining  the  truth 
in  regard  to  his  present  mental  state.     , 

Furthermore,  in  the  definition  of  this  state,  we  should  make 
some  restrictions.  Most  subnormal  children,  especially  those  in 
the  schools,  are  habitually  grouped  in  two  categories,  those  of 
backward  intelhgence,  and  those  who  are  unstable.  This  latter 
class,  which  certain  aUenists  call  moral  imbeciles,  do  not  neces- 
sarily manifest  inferiority  of  intelligence;  they  are  turbulent, 
vicious,  rebellious  to  all  discipline;  they  lack  sequence  of  ideas, 
and  probably  power  of  attention.  It  is  a  matter  of  great  delicacy 
to  make  the  distinction  between  children  who  are  unstable,  and 
those  who  have  rebellious  dispositions.  Elsewhere  we  have  in- 
sisted upon  the  necessity  of  instructors  not  treating  as  unstable, 
that  is  as  pathological  cases,  those  children  whose  character  is  not 
S3niipathetic  with  their  own.  It  would  necessitate  a  long  study, 
and  probably  a  very  difficult  one,  to  establish  the  distinctive  signs 
which  separate  the  unstable  from  the  undisciplined.     For  the 

37 


.'^ 


38  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

present  we  shall  not  take  up  this  study.  We  shall  set  the  unstable 
aside,  and  shall  consider  only  that  which  bears  upon  those  who 
are  backward  in  intelligence. 

This  is  not,  however,  to  be  the  only  limitation  of  our  subject 
because  backward  states  of  intelligence  present  several  different 
types.  There  is  the  insane  type — or  the  type  of  intellectual  de- 
cay— which  consists  in  a  progressive  loss  of  former  acquired  intel- 
ligence. Many  epileptics,  who  suffer  from  frequent  attacks,  prog- 
ress toward  insanity.  It  would  \>e  possible  and  probably  very 
important,  to  be  able  to  make  the  distinction  between  those  with 
decajdng  intelligence  on  the  one  hand,  and  those  of  inferior  intel- 
ligence on  the  other.  But  as  we  have  determined  to  limit  on  this 
side  also,  the  domain  of  our  study,  we  shall  rigorously  exclude  all 
forms  of  insanity  and  decay.  Moreover  we  beheve  that  these  are 
rarely  present  in  the  schools,  and  need  not  be  taken  into  considera- 
tion in  the  operation  of  new  classes  for  subnormals. 

Another  distinction  is  made  between  those  of  inferior  intelli- 
gence and  degenerates.  The  latter  are  subjects  in  whom  occur 
clearly  defined,  episodical  phenomena,  such  as  impulsions,  obses- 
sions, deliriums.  We  shall  eliminate  the  degenerates  as  well  as 
the  insane. 

Lastly,  we  should  say  a  word  upon  our  manner  of  studying 
those  whom  most  alienists  call  idiots  but  whom  we  here  call  of 
inferior  intelligence.  The  exact  nature  of  this  inferiority  is  not 
known;  and  today  without  other  proof,  one  very  prudently  re- 
fuses to  liken  this  state  to  that  of  an  arrest  of  normal  development. 
It  certainly  seems  that  the  intelHgence  of  these  beings  has  under- 
gone a  certain  arrest;  but  it  does  not  follow  that  the  dispropor- 
tion between  the  degree  of  intelligence  and  the  age  is  the  only 
characteristic  of  their  condition.  There  is  also  in  many  cases, 
most  probably  a  deviation  in  the  development,  a  perversion. 
The  idiot  of  fifteen  years,  who,  like  a  baby  of  three,  is  making  his 
first  verbal  attempts,  can  not  be  completely  likened  to  a  three- 
year  old  child,  because  the  latter  is  normal,  but  the  idiot  is  not. 
There  exists  therefore  between  them,  necessarily,  differences  either 
apparent  or  hidden.  The  careful  study  of  idiots  shows,  among 
some  of  them  at  least,  that  whereas  certain  faculties  are  almost 
wanting,  others  are  better  developed.  They  have  therefore  cer- 
tain aptitudes.  Some  have  a  good  auditory  or  musical  memory, 
and  a  whole  repertoire  of  songs;  others  have  mechanical  ability. 


NEW   METHODS   FOR  DIAGNOSIS  39 

If  all  were  carefully  examined,  many  examples  of  these  partial 

V aptitudes  would  probably  be  found. 
Our  purpose  is  in  no  wise  to  study,  analyze,  or  set  forth  the 
aptitudes  of  those  of  inferior  intelligence.  That  will  be  the  object 
of  a  later  work.  Here  we  shall  limit  ourselves  to  the  measuring  of 
their  general  intelHgence.  We  shall  determine  their  intellectual 
level,  and,  in  order  the  better  to  appreciate  this  level,  we  shall 
compare  it  with  that  of  normal  children  of  the  same  age  or  of  an 
analogous  level.  The  reservations  previously  made  as  to  the  true 
conception  of  arrested  development,  will  not  prevent  our  finding 
great  advantage  in  a  methodical  comparison  between  those  of 
inferior  and  those  of  normal  intelligence. 

To  what  method  should  we  have  recourse  in  making  our  diag- 
nosis of  the  intellectual  level?  No  one  method  exists,  but  there 
are  a  number  of  different  ones  which  should  be  used  cumulatively, 
because  the  question  is  a  very  difficult  one  to  solve,  and  demands 
rather  a  collaboration  of  methods.  It  is  important  that  the  prac- 
titioner be  equipped  in  such  a  manner  that  he  shall  use,  only  as 
accessory,  the  information  given  by  the  parents  of  the  child,  so 
that  he  may  always  be  able  to  verify  this  information,  or,  when 
necessary,  dispense  with  it.  In  actual  practice  quite  the  oppo- 
site occurs.  When  the  child  is  taken  to  the  chnic  the  physi- 
cian listens  a  great  deal  to  the  parents  and  questions  the  child 
very  little,  in  fact  scarcely  looks  at  him,  allowing  himself  to  be 
influenced  by  a  very  strong  presumption  that  the  child  is  intel- 
lectually inferior.  If,  by  a  chance  not  likely  to  occur,  but  which 
^ould  be  most  interesting  some  time  to  bring  about,  the  physician 
were  submitted  to  the  test  of  selecting  the  subnormals  from  a 
mixed  group  of  children,  he  would  certainly  find  himself  in  the 
midst  of  grave  difficulties,  and  would  commit  many  errors  espe- 
cially in  cases  of  slight  defect. 

The  organization  of  methods  is  especially  important  because, 
as  soon  as  the  schools  for  subnormals  are  in  operation,  one  must 
be  on  his  guard  against  the  attitude  of  the  parents.  Their  sincer- 
ity will  be  worth  very  Httle  when  it  is  in  conflict  with  their  inter- 
ests. If  the  parents  wish  the  child  to  remain  in  the  regular  school, 
they  will  not  be  silent  concerning  his  intelligence.  "My  child 
understands  everything,"  they  will  say,  and  they  will  be  very 
careful  not  to  give  any  significant  information  in  regard  to  him. 
If,  on  the  contrary,  they  wish  him  to  be  admitted  into  an  institu- 


)  V 


40  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

tion  where  gratuitous  board  and  lodging  are  furnished,  they  will 
change  completely.  They  will  be  capable  even  of  teaching  him 
how  to  simulate  mental  debility.  One  should,  therefore,  be  on 
his  guard  against  all  possible  frauds. 
/^  Y  In  order  to  recognize  the  inferior  states  of  intelligence  we  be- 
lieve that  three  different  methods  should  be  employed.  We  have 
arrived  at  this  synthetic  view  only  after  many  years  of  research, 
but  we  are  now  certain  that  each  of  these  methods  renders  some 
service.    These  methods  are : 

1.  The  medical  method,  which  aims  to  appreciate  the  anatomical, 
physiological,  and  pathological  signs  of  inferior  intelligence. 

2.  The  pedagogical  method,  which  aims  to  judge  of  the  intelli- 
gence according  to  the  sum  of  acquired  knowledge. 

3.  The  psychological  method,  which  makes  direct  observations 
and  measurements  of  the  degree  of  intelligence. 

From  what  has  gone  before  it  is  easy  to  see  the  value  of  each  of 
these  methods.  The  medical  method  is  indirect  because  it  con- 
jectures the  mental  from  the  physical.  The  pedagogical  method 
is  more  direct;  but  the  psychological  is  the  most  direct  of  all  be- 
cause it  aims  to  measure  the  state  of  the  intelligence  as  it  is  at  the 
present  moment.  It  does  this  by  experiments  which  oblige  the 
subject  to  make  an  effort  which  shows  his  capability  in  the  way  of 
comprehension,  judgment,  reasoning,  and  invention. 


I.  The  Psychological  Method 


/ 


The  fundamental  idea  of  this  method  is  the  establishment  of 
what  we  shall  call  a  measuring  scale  of  intelligence.  This  scale  is 
composed  of  a  series  of  tests  of  increasing  difficulty,  starting  from 
the  lowest  intellectual  level  that  can  be  observed,  and  ending  with 
that  of  average  normal  intelligence.  Each  group  in  the  series 
corresponds  to  a  different  mental  level. 

This  scale  properly  speaking  does  not  permit  the  measure  of 
the  intelhgence,^  because  intellectual  qualities  are  not  super- 
posable,  and  therefore  cannot  be  measured  as  linear  surfaces  are 
measured,  but  are  on  the  contrary,  a  classification,  a  hierarchy 
among  diverse  intelligences;  and  for  the  necessities  of  practice 

*  One  of  us  (Binet)  has  elsewhere  insisted  that  a  distinction  be  made 
between  the  measure  and  the  classification.  See  ''Suggestibilite,"  p.  103, 
J^oL.,11,  UAnnee  Psychologique. 


THE   PSYCHOLOGICAL  METHOD     /  \J  41 

this  classification  is  equivalent  to  a  measure.  /We  shall  therefore 
be  able  to  know,  after  studying  two  individuals,  if  one  rises  above 
the  other  and  to  how  many  degrees,  if  one  rises  above  the  average 
level  of  other  individuals  considered  as  normal,  or  if  he  remains  be- 
low. Understanding  the  normal  progress  of  intellectual  develop- 
ment among  normals,  we  shall  be  able  to  determine  how  many 
years  such  an  individual  is  advanced  or  retarded.  In  a  word  we 
shall  be  able  to  determine  to  what  degrees  of  the  scale  idiocy,  im- 
becility, and  moronity^  correspond.  ^ 

The  scale  that  we  shall  describe  is  not  a  theoretical  work;  it  '^^^J^T/ 
the  result  of  long  investigations,  first  at  the  Salpetriere,  and  after-  ^E^ 
wards  in  the  primary  schools  of  Paris,  with  both  normal  and  sub- 
normal children.  These  short  psychological  questions  have  been 
given  the  name  of  tests.  The  use  of  tests  is  today  very  common, 
and  there  are  even  contemporary  authors  who  have  made  a  spe- 
cialty of  organizing  new  tests  according  to  theoretical  views,  but 
who  have  made  no  effort  to  patiently  try  them  out  in  the  schools. 
Theirs  is  an  amusing  occupation,  comparable  to  a  person's  making 
a  colonizing  expedition  into  Algeria,  advancing  always  only  upon 
the  map,  without  taking  off  his  dressing  gown.  We  place  but 
slight  confidence  in  the  tests  invented  by  these  authors  and  we 
have  borrowed  nothing  from  them.  All  the  tests  which  we  pro- 
pose have  been  repeatedly  tried,  and  have  been  retained  from 
among  many,  which  after  trial  have  been  discarded.  We  can  cer- 
tify that  those  which  are  here  presented  have  proved  themselves 
valuable. 

We  have  aimed  to  make  all  our  tests  simple,  rapid,  convenient,  y 
precise,  heterogeneous,  holding  the  subject  in  continued  contact  ^ 
with  the  experimenter,  and  bearing  principally  upon  the  faculty 
of  judgment.  Rapidity  is  necessary  for  this  sort  of  examination. 
It  is  impossible  to  prolong  it  beyond  twenty  minutes  without 
fatiguing  the  subject.  During  this  maximum  of  twenty  minutes, 
it  must  be  turned  and  turned  about  in  every  sense,  and  at  least 
ten  tests  must  be  executed,  so  that  not  more  than  about  two 
minutes  can  be  given  to  each.  In  spite  of  their  interest,  we  were 
obhged  to  proscribe  long  exercises.     For  example,  it  would  be 

^Editor's  note:  Binet's  classification  of  defectives  is  idiot,  imbecile, 
and  "d^bile."  This  seems  to  correspond  closely  to  our  American  ter- 
minology of  idiot,  imbecile,  and  moron.  We  have  accordingly  translated 
"debile"  as  moron  and  ''debility"  as  moronity. 


42  DEVELOPMEN*T    OF   INTELLIGENCE 

very  instructive  to  know  how  a  subject  learns  by  heart  a  series  of 
sentences.  We  have  often  tested  the  advantage  of  leaving  a  per- 
son by  himself  with  a  lesson  of  prose  or  verse  after  having  said  to 
him,  ''Try  to  learn  as  much  as  you  can  of  this  in  five  minutes." 
Five  minutes  is  too  long  for  our  test,  because  during  that  time  the 
subject  escapes  us;  it  may  be  that  he  becomes  distracted  or  thinks 
of  other  things;  the  test  loses  its  clinical  char^icter  and  becomes  too 
scholastic.  We  have  therefore  reluctantly  been  obliged  to  re- 
nounce testing  the  rapidity  and  extent  of  the  memory  by  this 
method.  Several  other  equivalent  examples  of  elimination  could 
be  cited.  In  order  to  cover  rapidly  a  wide  field  of  observation,  it 
goes  without  saying  that  the  tests  should  be  heterogeneous. 

Another  consideration.  Our  purpose  is  to  evaluate  a  level  of 
intelligence.  It  is  understood  that  we  here  separate  natural  intel- 
ligence and  instruction.  It  is  the  intelHgence  alone  that  we  seek 
to  measure,  by  disregarding  in  so  far  as  possible,  the  degree  of 
instruction  which  the  subject  possesses.  He  should,  indeed,'  be 
considered  by  the  examiner  as  a  complete  ignoramus  knowing 
neither  how  to  read  nor  write.  This  necessity  forces  us  to  forego 
a  great  many  exercises  having  a  verbal,  literary  or  scholastic  char- 
acter. These  belong  to  a  pedagogical  examination.  We  believe 
that  we  have  succeeded  in  completely  disregarding  the  acquired 
information  of  the  subject.  We  give  him  nothing  to  read,  noth- 
ing to  write,  and  submit  him  to  no  test  in  which  he  might  succeed 
by  means  of  rote  learning.  In  fact  we  do  not  even  notice  his  in- 
ability to  read  if  a  case  occurs.  It  is  simply  the  level  of  his  nat- 
ural intelligence  that  is  taken  into  account. 

But  here  we  must  come  to  an  understanding  of  what  meaning 
to  give  to  that  word  so  vague  and  so  comprehensive,  'Hhe  intelli- 
gence." Nearly  all  the  phenomena  with  which  psychology  con- 
cerns itself  are  phenomena  of  intelligence;  sensation,  perception, 
are  intellectual  manifestations  as  much  as  reasoning.  Should  we 
therefore  bring  into  our  examination  the  measure  of  sensation 
after  the  manner  of  the  psycho-physicists?  Should  we  put  to  the 
test  all  of  his  psychological  processes?  A  slight  reflection  has 
shown  us  that  this  would  indeed  be  wasted  time. 
f  It  seems  to  us  that  in  intelligence  there  is  a  fundamental  faculty, 
j/the  alteration  or  the  lack  of  which,  is  of  the  utmost  importance  for 
practical  life.  This  faculty  is  judgment,  otherwise  called  good 
sense,  practical  sense,  initiative,  the  faculty  of  adapting  one's  self 


THE   PSYCHOLOGICAL  METHOD  43 

to  circumstances.  To  judge  well,  to  comprehend  well,  to  reason 
well,  these  are  the  essential  activities  of  intelligence.  A  person 
may  be  a  moron  or  an  imbecile  if  he  is  lacking  in  judgment;  but 
with  good  judgment  he  can  never  be  either.  Indeed  the  rest  of 
the  intellectual  faculties  seem  of  little  importance  in  comparison 
with  judgment,  j  What  does  it  matter,  for  example,  whether  the 
organs  of  sense  function  normally?  Of  what  import  that  certain 
ones  are  hyperesthetic,  or  that  others  are  anesthetic  or  are  weak- 
ened? Laura  Bridgman,  Helen  Keller  and  their  fellow-unfortu- 
nates were  blind  as  well  as  deaf,  but  this  did  not  prevent  them 
from  being  very  intelligent.  Certainly  this  is  demonstrative  proof 
that  the  total  or  even  partial  integrity  of  the  senses  does  not  form 
a  mental  factor  equal  to  judgment.  We  may  measure  the  acute- 
ness  of  the  sensibility  of  subjects;  nothing  could  be  easier.  But 
we  should  do  this,  not  so  much  to  find  out  the  state  of  their  sen- 
sibility as  to  learn  the  exactitude  of  their  judgment. 

The  same  remark  holds  good  for  the  study  of  the  memory.  At 
first  glance,  memory  being  a  psychological  phenomenon  of  capital 
importance,  one  would  be  tempted  to  give  it  a  very  conspicuous 
part  in  an  examination  of  intelligence.  But  memory  is  distinct 
from  and  independent  of  judgment.  One  may  have  good  sense 
and  lack  memory.  The  reverse  is  also  common.  Just  at  the 
present  time  we  are  observing  a  backward  girl  who  is  developing 
before  our  astonished  eyes  a  memory  very  much  greater  than  our 
own.  We  have  measured  that  memory  and  we  are  not  deceived 
regarding  it.  Nevertheless  that  girl  presents  a  most  beautifully 
classic  type  of  imbecility. 

As  a  result  of  all  this  investigation,  in  the  scale  which  we  present 
we  accord  the  first  place  to  judgment;  that  which  is  of  importance  J  ; 
to  us  is  not  certain  errors  which  the  subject  commits,  but  absurd 
errors,  which  prove  that  he  lacks  judgment.  We  have  even  made 
special  provision  to  encourage  people  to  make  absurd  replies.  In 
spite  of  the  accuracy  of  this  directing  idea,  it  will  be  easily  under- 
stood that  it  has  been  impossible  to  permit  of  its  regulating  exclu- 
sively our  examinations.  For  example,  one  can  not  make  tests 
of  judgment  on  children  of  less  than  two  years  when  one  begins  to 
watch  their  first  gleams  of  intelligence.  Much  is  gained  when  one 
can  discern  in  them  traces  of  coordination,  the  first  deHneation  of 
attention  and  memory.  We  shall  therefore  bring  out  in  our  lists 
some  tests  of  memory;  but  so  far  as  we  are  able,  we  shall  give  these 


44  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

tests  such  a  turn  as  to  invite  the  subject  to  make  absurd  repUes, 
and  thus  under  cover  of  a  test  of  memory,  we  shall  have  an  appre- 
ciation of  their  judgment. 

MEASURING   SCALE   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

General  recommendations.  The  examination  should  take  place 
in  a  quiet  room,  quite  isolated,  and  the  child  should  be  called  in 
alone  without  other  children.  It  is  important  that  when  a  child 
sees  the  experimenter  for  the  first  time,  he  should  be  reassured  by 
the  presence  of  someone  he  knows,  a  relative,  an  attendant,  or  a 
school  superintendent.  The  witness  should  be  instructed  to  re- 
main passive  and  mute,  and  not  to  intervene  in  the  examination 
either  by  word  or  gesture. 

The  experimenter  should  receive  each  child  with  a  friendly 
familiarity  to  dispel  the  timidity  of  early  years.  Greet  him  the 
moment  he  enters,  shake  hands  with  him  and  seat  him  comfort- 
ably. If  he  is  intelHgent  enough  to  understand  certain  words, 
awaken  his  curiosity,  his  pride.  If  he  refuses  to  reply  to  a  test, 
pass  to  the  next  one,  or  perhaps  offer  him  a  piece  of  candy;  if  his 
silence  continues,  send  him  away  until  another  time.  These  are 
little  incidents  that  frequently  occur  in  an  examination  of  the 
mental  state,  because  in  its  last  analysis,  an  examination  of  this 
kind  is  based  upon  the  good  will  of  the  subject. 

We  here  give  the  technique  of  each  question.  It  will  not  suffice 
simply  to  read  what  we  have  written  in  order  to  be  able  to  conduct 
examinations.  A  good  experimenter  can  be  produced  only  by 
example  and  imitation,  and  nothing  equals  the  lesson  gained  from 
the  thing  itself.  Every  person  who  wishes  to  famiharize  himself 
with  our  method  of  examination  should  come  to  our  school. 
Theoretical  instruction  is  valuable  only  when  it  merges  into  prac- 
tical experience.  Having  made  these  reservations,  let  us  point 
out  the  principal  errors  likely  to  be  committed  by  inexperienced 
persons.  There  are  two:  the  first  consists  in  recording  the  gross 
results  without  making  psychological  observations,  without  notic- 
ing such  little  facts  as  permit  one  to  give  to  the  gross  results  their 
true  value.  The  second  error,  equally  frequent,  is  that  of  making 
suggestions.  An  inexperienced  examiner  has  no  idea  of  the  influ- 
ence of  words;  he  talks  too  much,  he  aids  his  subject,  he  puts  him 
on  the  track,  unconscious  of  the  help  he  is  thus  giving.     He  plays 


SERIES   OF   TESTS — 1905  45 

the  part  of  pedagogue,  when  he  should  remain  psychologist. 
Thus  his  examination  is  vitiated.  It  is  a  difficult  art  to  be  able 
to  encourage  a  subject,  to  hold  his  attention,  to  make  him  do  his 
best  without  giving  aid  in  any  form  by  an  unskillful  suggestion.' 

THE   SERIES   OF   TESTS  ,        (^  -  <?      v         >ia^ 

1.  "Le  Regard'''  '  t.'*^    \r^/^ 

In  this  test  the  examiner  seeks  to  discover  if  there  exists  that 
coordination  in  the  movement  of  the  head  and  the  eyes  which  is 
associated  with  the  act  of  vision.  If  such  coordination  does  exist 
it  proves  that  the  subject  not  only  sees  but  more  than  that  he 
"regards"  (that  is  he  is  able  to  follow  with  his  eyes  a  moving 
object). 

Procedure.  A  lighted  match  is  slowly  moved  before  the  eyes 
of  the  subject  in  such  a  way  as  to  provoke  a  movement  of  the  head 
or  of  the  eyes  to  follow  the  flame.  If  a  first  attempt  does  not  suc- 
ceed the  experiment  should  be  tried  again  after  a  httle  while.  It 
is  preferable  to  operate  in  a  quiet  place  where  no  kind  of  distrac- 
tion is  likely  to  occur.  It  is  not  important  that  the  subject  follow 
the  movements  of  the  match  constantly  for  any  length  of  time  or 
persistently.  The  least  sign  of  coordination  of  the  movements  of 
vision  is  sufficient,  if  it  leaves  no  doubt  in  the  mind  of  the  exam- 
iner. 

Additional  remarks.  The  observation  of  a  few  spontaneous 
phenomena  may  well  be  noted.  Thus  it  is  possible  sometimes  for 
the  examiner,  by  fixing  his  gaze  steadily  upon  the  child,  to  satisfy 
himself  that  the  child  really  coordinates  for  a  moment.  If  the 
subject  is  afflicted  with  or  suspected  of  blindness,  the  visual  stim- 
ulus may  be  replaced  by  an  auditory  stimulus.  For  example,  call 
him  loudly,  or  better,  ring  a  little  bell  behind  his  head  and  notice 

3  One  of  us  (Binet)  has  been  for  some  years  the  president  of  "Soci6t6 
libre  pour  I'^tude  de  Tenfant,"  and  he  has  striven  to  spread  among  his 
colleagues,  mostly  teachers,  the  taste  for  scientific  research.  He  has 
found  that  the  two  errors  mentioned  in  the  text  are  those  which  appear 
most  frequently  among  beginners. 

^  Editor's  note:  We  have  here  retained  the  word  used  by  Binet,  because 
in  the  English  there  is  no  one  word  exactly  synonymous  with  it.  The 
word  literally  translated  means  "the  ability  to  follow  with  the  eyes  a 
moving  object." 


46  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

if  he  turns  his  head  toward  the  sound,  or  if  he  has  any  pecuhar 
facial  expression  which  would  indicate  that  he  hears.  The  re- 
action of  attention  to  sound  seems  to  develop  later  than  the  re- 
action to  light.  We  have  observed  children  who,  when  a  bell  was 
rung  behind  the  head,  would  not  make  a  single  movement  in  order 
to  hear  better,  and  yet  would  follow  with  their  eyes  the  lighted 
match.  It  is  scarcely  necessary  to  add  that  the  child  who  hides 
his  face  behind  his  hand  when  questioned,  or  who  repHes  to  your 
smile  by  a  smile,  or  who  walks  about  the  room  without  knocking 
against  obstacles,  stove,  chairs,  wall,  table,  proves  by  his  behavior 
that  he  coordinates  the  movements  of  vision,  and  thus  he  has 
passed  the  first  test. 

2.  Prehension  Provoked  by  a  Tactile  Stimulus 

Here  the  purpose  is  to  discover  whether  the  coordination  exists 
between  a  tactile  stimulus  of  the  hand,  and  the  movement  of 
seizing  and  carrying  to  the  mouth. 

Procedure.  A  small  object,  easily  handled,  for  example  a  piece 
of  wood,  is  placed  in  contact  with  the  hand  of  the  child  in  order  to 
determine  if  he  succeeds  in  seizing  the  object,  holding  it  in  his 
hand  without  letting  it  fall,  and  carrying  it  to  his  mouth.  It  is 
well  to  stimulate  the  contact  either  on  the  back  of  the  hand  or  on 
the  palm,  and  note  the  results.  It  is  possible  that  the  subject, 
after  having  taken  the  little  object,  loosens  his  fingers  and  lets  it 
fall.  It  is  necessary  in  that  case  to  try  again  with  a  little  patience, 
in  order  to  learn  if  the  letting  go  came  of  a  chance  distraction,  or 
if  the  subject  is  not  capable  of  performing  the  muscular  act  which 
would  consist  in  carrying  it  to  his  mouth. 

3.  Prehension  Provoked  by  a  Visual  Perception 

Here  the  purpose  is  to  find  whether  coordination  exists  between 
the  sight  of  an  object  and  its  prehension,  when  the  object  is  not 
placed  in  contact  with  the  hand  of  the  subject. 

Procedure.  The  object  is  presented  to  his  view  and  within  reach 
of  his  hand,  in  a  manner  to  provoke  an  intentional  movement  of 
his  hand  to  take  it.  Thisj^ird  test  is  passed  when  the  subject, 
following  a  visual  perception  of  the  object,  makes  a  movement  of 
the  hand  towards  the  object,  reaches,  seizes  and  carries  it  to  his 
mouth.    A  small  cube  of  white  wood,  easy  to  handle  is  used.     In 


SERIES    OF  TESTS — 1905  47 

these  presentations  it  is  not  forbidden  to  speak  and  hence  the  ob- 
ject is  offered  to  the  child  as  follows:  "Here  is  a  httle  object,  take 
it,  it  is  for  you — Come  now,  pay  attention,  etc."  If  the  subject 
understands,  so  much  the  better  for  him;  if  he  does  not  under- 
stand the  sound  of  these  words  has  the  advantage  of  attracting 
his  attention.  Moreover  the  examiner  makes  gestures  and  makes 
them  more  naturally  if  he  talks  at  the  same  time. 

4.  Recognition  of  Food 

Here  the  purpose  is  to  discover  whether  the  subject  can  make  the 
distinction  by  sight  between  familiar  food  and  what  can  not  be 
eaten. 

Procedure.  A  piece  of  chocolate  (half  a  bar)  and  a  little  cube 
of  white  wood  of  similar  dimensions  are  successively  presented. 
The  test  is  to  see  if  the  subject,  by  sight  alone,  makes  the  distinc- 
tion between  the  two  objects  before  carrying  them  to  his  mouth. 
Does  he  carry  only  the  chocolate  to  his  mouth  and  begin  to  eat  it? 
Does  he  refuse  to  take  the  piece  of  wood,  or  having  taken  it  does 
he  push  it  away,  or  again  does  he  hold  it  in  his  hand  without  put- 
ting it  to  his  mouth? 

Tests  3  and  4  can  be  made  rapidly  as  a  single  experiment.  A 
piece  of  chocolate  is  first  shown  to  the  child  and  his  attention  is 
drawn  to  it.  Note  whether  he  tries  to  take  it  or  not.  If  he  makes 
no  effort  to  attain  it,  and  is  not  distracted  by  anything,  place  the 
chocolate  in  the  palm  of  his  hand,  and  note  what  happens.  If  on 
the  contrary  he  takes  the  chocolate  which  is  shown  him  and  carries 
it  to  his  mouth,  the  chocolate  is  taken  from  him,  and  the  piece  of 
wood  put  in  its  place,  to  see  if  he  carries  this  new  object  also  to 
his  mouth. 

Although  these  tests  succeed  with  very  many  children  by  ap- 
pealing to  their  greediness,  it  often  happens  that  a  willful  child,  or 
one  frightened  by  the  sight  of  the  examiner  whom  he  does  not 
know,  turns  away  from  him  and  refuses  to  look  at  what  is  shown 
him.  These  movements  of  defense  indicate  already  a  mentaUty 
that  corresponds  most  likely  to  the  fourth  degree.  The  experi- 
menter must  be  armed  with  patience  an^yjj^ntleness.  He  may  have 
a  relative,  an  attendant,  or  any  other  person  who  knows  the  child, 
present  the  chocolate,  but  he  must  carefully  note  the  behavior  of 
the  child  throughout  the  operation.     If  the  attack  of  anger,  or 


48  DEVELOPMENT   OF    INTELLIGENCE 

tears,  or  fear  lasts  too  long,  the  examination  is  necessarily  sus- 
pended to  be  taken  up  at  a  more  favorable  time.  These  are  the 
disappointments  to  which  alienists  are  accustomed. 

5.  Quest  of  Food  Complicated  by  a  Slight  Mechanical  Difficulty 

This  test  is  designed  to  bring  into  play  a  rudiment  of  memory,  an 
effort  of  will,  and  a  coordination  of  movements. 

Procedure.  First  be  sure  that  the  child  recognizes  the  candy  or 
bonbon  to  be  used  in  this  experiment.  Then  while  he  is  watching 
you,  wrap  the  bonbon  in  a  piece  of  paper.  Present  it  to  him  and 
carefully  note  his  movements.  Does  he  remember  that  the  paper 
contains  a  bonbon?  Does  he  reject  it  as  a  useless  object,  or  does 
he  try  to  pull  it  apart?  Does  he  carry  the  covered  morsel  to  his 
mouth?  Does  he  eat  the  paper  or  does  he  make  feome  effort  to 
unfold  it?  Does  he  completely  succeed  in  unfolding  it,  or  does  he 
seem  satisfied  with  one  attempt?  Does  he  present  the  covered 
morsel  to  some  one  else  as  if  to  ask  his  aid? 

6.  Execution  of  Simple  Commands  and  Imitation  of  Simple  Gestures 

This  test  involves  various  motor  coordinations,  and  associa- 
tions between  certain  movements,  and  the  understanding  of  the 
significance  of  certain  gestures.  In  these  tests  the  subject  enters 
for  the  first  time  into  social  relations  with  the  experimenter  and 
it  is  therefore  necessary  that  he  understand  the  will  and  desires 
of  the  latter.     It  is  the  beginning  of  inter-psychology. 

Procedure.  As  soon  as  the  subject  enters  the  room  say  good' 
morning  to  him  with  expression,  give  him  your  hand  with  accen- 
tuated gesture  to  see  if  he  understands  the  salutation  and  if  he 
knows  how  to  shake  hands.  In  cases  where  the  subject  walks  in, 
ask  him  to  be  seated;  this  permits  one  to  see  whether  he  under- 
stands the  meaning  of  the  invitation  and  if  he  knows  the  use  of  a 
chair.  Throw  some  object  on  the  floor  and  request  him  by  ges- 
tures as  well  as  by  speech  to  pick  it  up  and  give  it  back.  Make 
him  get  up,  shut  the  door,  send  him  away,  call  him  back.  So 
much  for  commands.  Imitation  of  simple  gestures  is  accom- 
plished by  fixing  his  attention  by  repeating  several  times,  ''Look 
at  me  carefully,"  and  when  his  attention  is  gained,  by  saying 
"Do  as  I  do."  The  examiner  then  claps  his  hands  together,  puts 
them  in  the  air,  on  the  shoulders,  behind  the  back;  he  turns  the 


SERIES    OF   TESTS 1905  49 

thumbs  one  about  the  other,  raises  the  foot,  etc.  All  this  mimi- 
cry must  be  conducted  gaily  with  the  air  of  play.  It  is  sufficient 
if  a  single  well  marked  imitation  is  provoked;  the  rest  is  unneces- 
sary. Do  not  confound  the  inaptitude  for  imitation,  with  bad 
humor,  ill-will,  or  timidity. 

7.  Verbal  Knowledge  of  Objects 

The  object  of  this  test  is  to  discover  if  associations  exist  be- 
tween things  and  their  names.  Comprehension  and  the  first  pos- 
sibilities of  language  are  here  studied.  This  test  is  a  continuation 
of  the  previous  one  and  represents  the  second  degree  of  communi- 
cation between  individuals;  the  first  degree  is  made  through  imi- 
tation, the  second  through  words. 

Procedure.  This  test  is  composed  of  two  parts.  In  the  first 
place  the  examiner  names  a  part  of  the  body  and  asks  the  child  to 
point  to  it.  The  questions  may  relate  to  the  head,  the  hair,  the 
eyes,  the  feet,  the  hands,  the  nose,  the  ears,  the  mouth.  Ask  the 
child  with  a  smile  ''Where  is  your  head?"  If  he  seems  embar- 
rassed or  timid,  encourage  him  by  aiding  him  a  little.  ''There  is 
your  head,''  pointing  it  out  and  touching  it  if  the  child  does  not 
seem  to  understand  what  is  wanted  of  him.  On  the  other  hand  if 
he  replies  by  a  correct  designation  to  the  first  question  go  no 
further,  because  if  he  knows  where  his  head  is  he  should  know 
equally  well  where  are  his  ears  and  his  mouth.  Give  him  there- 
fore some  more  difiicult  questions,  for  example,  his  cheek,  his  eye- 
brow, his  heart. 

The  second  part  of  the  experiment  consists  in  making  him  desig- 
nate familiar  objects,  a  string,  a  cup,  a  key.  Bring  the  child  to 
the  table  and  by  means  of  gestures  indicate  the  objects  and  turn 
his  attention  to  them.  When  his  attention  is  fixed  upon  the  ob- 
jects tell  him  to  give  you  the  one  you  name.  "Give  me  the  cup. 
Give  me  the  key,  etc.''  The  cup,  the  key,  the  string  are  the  three 
objects  asked  for.  It  is  of  little  importance  that  he  shows  awk- 
wardness in  taking  and  presenting  them.  The  essential  is  that  by 
the  play  of  the  countenance  and  gestures,  he  indicates  clearly  that 
he  distinguishes  these  objects  by  their  names.  It  is  preferable  to 
keep  these  three  objects,  others  less  familiar  should  be  rejected,  as 
for  instance  a  box  of  matches,  a  cork,  etc.  The  test  is  made  with 
three  objects  in  order  to  avoid  the  right  designation  by  simple 


50  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

chance.  With  backward  children  the  following  facts  may  present 
themselves.  They  do  not  know  the  name  of  the  object  presented 
to  them,  but  having  understood  that  they  are  to  designate  an 
object,  they  point  to  anything  that  is  on  the  table.  This  is  a  man- 
ner of  reacting  very  common  among  idiots  and  imbeciles.  They 
make  mistakes  but  they  do  not  reahze  it,  being  in  fact  very  well 
satisfied  with  their  achievements.  Here  is  another  source  of 
error  to  be  avoided.  In  consequence  of  their  extreme  docility, 
many  backward  children  may  be  bewildered  by  the  least  contra- 
diction. When  they  have  handed  you  a  cup,  if  you  ask  them 
"Isn't  this  a  key?''  some  might  make  a  sign  of  acquiescence. 
This  is  a  test  of  suggestibility  of  which  more  will  be  said  further  on. 
To  a  blind  child,  give  objects  to  be  recognized  by  the  sense  of 
touch. 

8,  Verbal  Knowledge  of  Pictures 

This  exercise  is  the  same  as  the  preceding  one  with  this  differ- 
ence only,  that  the  objects  are  replaced  by  pictures  which,  in  con- 
sequence of  the  diminished  size  and  the  reduction  to  a  plane  sur- 
face, are  a  little  more  difficult  to  recognize  than  in  nature,  and 
more  than  this  in  a  picture  the  objects  must  be  sought  for. 

Procedure.  We  make  use  of  a  print  borrowed  from  the  picture- 
book  of  Inspector  Lacabe  and  Mile.  Goergin.  This  print  in 
colors  represents  a  complex  family  scene.  We  show  the  print  to 
tn  ^hild  and  ask  him  to  designate  successively  the  following  ob- 
jf  r.  the  window,  mamma,  big  sister,  little  sister,  little  girl,  cat, 
broom,  basket,  bouquet,  duster,  coffee-mill.  The  questions  are 
asked  in  this  way:  ''Where  is  the  window?"  or  ''Tell  me  where 
the  window  is."  or  "Show  me  the  window,"  or  "Put  your  finger 
on  the  window." 

The  last  suggestion  is  generally  unnecessary  because  the  child 
has  a  tendency  to  place  his  forefinger,  generally  a  dirty  one,  upon 
the  detail  which  is  named  for  him.  If  he  makes  an  error  in  designa- 
tion be  careful  not  to  correct  it,  but  make  a  note  of  it.  In  a 
psychological  examination  of  this  kind,  one  must  never  point  out 
to  a  child  the  errors  which  he  makes.  The  examiner  is  not  a 
pedagogue.  It  is  rare  that  those  who  take  an  interest  in  the  pic- 
ture can  not  designate  the  principal  details  named  to  them.  The 
incapable  ones  give  no  attention  to  the  picture  and  do  not  seem  to 
comprehend  what  is  wanted  of  them.     It  is  interesting  to  study 


SERIES   OF  TESTS — 1905  51 

the  attitude  of  a  child  during  this  test.  There  are  two  acts  to  be 
accomphshed,  one  a  search  for  the  object,  the  other  the  recogni- 
tion of  the  object.  At  once  in  the  search  the  aptitudes  or  inapti- 
tudes betray  themselves.  Many  defective  persons  show  an  ex- 
cess of  eagerness  to  designate  the  object,  which  in  itself  is  a  sign  of 
faulty  attention.  They  point  out  at  once  without  waiting  to 
comprehend.  They  sometimes  point  out  before  one  has  finished 
the  sentence.  ''Where  is  the  — ,"  said  with  a  suspension  in  the 
voice,  and  already  their  finger  is  placed  haphazard  upon  the  pic- 
ture. Such  as  these  do  not  hunt  with  care  and  are  incapable  of 
suspending  their  judgment.  This  is,  it  seems  to  us,  a  striking 
characteristic  of  a  weak  mind.  The  child  must  be  closely  studied 
in  order  to  find  if,  in  spite  of  this  special  manner,  he  really  knows 
the  names  of  the  objects.  A  reprimand  gently  given  will  some- 
times put  him  on  his  guard,  ''No,  no,  pay  attention,  you  go  too 
fast,"  and  if  the  question  is  repeated  he  will  often  give  a  correct 
answer. 

In  other  cases,  errors  are  sometimes  made  through  suggestibil- 
ity. The  subject  seems  to  imagine  that  he  will  commit  a  fault  if 
he  does  not  designate  some  object  when  the  question  is  asked, 
and  out  of  compliance  or  of  timidity,  he  makes  an  erroneous  desig- 
nation for  an  object  whose  name  he  does  not  know,  or  which  he 
does  not  succeed  in  finding.  Notice  again,  the  more  reasonable 
attitude  of  those  who,  not  knowing  the  name  of  the  obj er-t,  re- 
frain from  pointing  it  out  but  continue  the  search  or  repl^  ^i& 
tinctly,  "I  do  not  know."  It  is  rare  that  an  imbecile  uses  that 
little  phrase.  The  avowal  of  ignorance  is  a  proof  of  judgment 
and  is  always  a  good  indication. 

9.  Naming  of  Designated  Objects 

This  test  is  the  opposite  of  the  preceding  one.  It  shows  the 
passing  from  the  thing  to  the  word.  It  also  is  executed  by  the 
use  of  pictures. 

Procedure.  Here  we  make  use  of  another  colored  print  borrowed 
from  the  same  collection  as  the  preceding.  We  place  it  before 
the  eyes  of  the  child  and  designate  with  a  pencil  different  objects 
while  asking  each  time,  "What  is  this?"  The  objects  upon  which 
we  place  the  pencil  are  the  little  girl,  the  dog,  the  boy,  the  father, 
the  lamp-lighter,  the  sky,  the  advertisement.     For  the  lamp- 


52  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

lighter  we  ask  what  he  does.  Here  as  elsewhere  it  is  unnecessary 
to  exhaust  the  complete  series  of  questions  unless  the  subject  fails. 
One  or  two  positive  repHes  are  sufficient  to  satisfy  the  require- 
ments of  the  test.  This  test  permits  us  to  know  the  vocabulary 
and  the  pronunciation  of  the  child.  Defects  of  pronunciation,  so 
frequent  in  the  young,  are  a  serious  source  of  embarrassment.  It 
often  requires  a  very  indulgent  ear  to  recognize  the  right  word  in 
an  indistinct  and  very  brief  murmur,  and  in  a  case  of  this  sort  the 
examiner  will  do  well  to  use  an  interrogation  point.  Added  to  the 
difficulties  which  proceed  from  faulty  pronunciation,  are  those 
brought  about  by  a  special  vocabulary.  Many  little  children 
though  normal  use  a  vocabulary  invented  or  deformed  by  them, 
which  is  understood  only  by  themselves  and  their  parents. 

Additional  remarks.  Tests  7,  8,  and  9  do  not  constitute  dif- 
fering degrees  in  the  rigorous  sense  of  the  word,  that  is  to  say  they 
are  not  tests  corresponding  to  different  levels  of  intelligence. 
We  have  ascertained  that  generally  with  subnormals  those  who 
can  pass  test  7,  pass  8  and  also  9.  These  would  therefore  be  tests 
of  equal  rank.  We  have  kept  them,  however,  because  these  tests 
occupy  an  important  place  in  our  measuring  scale  of  intelligence, 
as  they  constitute  a  borderline  test  between  imbecility  and  idiocy. 
It  is  useful  to  have  this  borderline  solidly  placed  and  all  these  tests 
will  serve  as  buttresses. 

Observations,  such  as  one  may  make  every  day  on  those  afflicted 
with  general  paralysis,  aphasia,  or  simply  people  very  much 
fatigued,  show  that  it  is  much  more  difficult  to  pass  from  the  ob- 
ject to  the  word  than  it  is  to  pass  from  the  word  to  the  object,  or 
we  may  say,  that  one  recognizes  a  word  more  easily  than  one  finds 
it.  It  does  not  seem  clear  up  to  the  present  that  this  observation 
is  also  applicable  to  inferior  states  of  intelligence. 

10.  Immediate  Comparison  of  Two  Lines  of  Unequal  Lengths^ 

As  we  enter  the  field  of  what  may  properly  be  called  psychologi- 
cal experimentation,  we  shall  find  it  difficult  to  define  which  men- 
tal functions  are  being  exercised  because  they  are  very  numerous. 
Here  the  child  must  understand  that  it  is  a  question  of  compari- 
son, that  the  comparison  is  between  two  lines  that  are  shown  to 
him;  he  must  understand  the  meaning  of  the  words,  ''Show  me 

"  Cf.  p.  196. 


r 


SERIES    OF    TESTS 1905  53 

the  longer."  He  must  be  capable  of  comparing,  that  is  of  bring- 
ing together  a  conception  and  an  image,  and  of  turning  his  mind 
in  the  direction  of  searching  for  a  difference.  We  often  have 
illusions  as  to  the  simplicity  of  psychical  processes,  because  we 
judge  them  in  relation  to  others,  still  more  complex.  In  fact  here 
is  a  test  which  will  seem  to  show  but  little  mentality  in  those  who 
are  able  to  execute  it;  nevertheless  when  analyzed  it  reveals  a 
great  complexity. 

Procedure.  The  subject  is  presented  successively  with  three 
pieces  of  paper  upon  each  of  which  two  lines,  drawn  in  ink,  are  to 
be  compared.  Each  piece  of  paper  measures  15  by  20  cm.;  the 
lines  are  drawn  lengthwise  of  the  paper,  on  the  same  level,  and 
separated  by  a  space  of  5  mm.  The  lines  are  respectively  4  and 
3  cm.  in  length  and  one-half  of  a  millimeter  in  width.  On  the 
first  sheet  the  longer  line  is  at  the  right  and  on  the  other  two  at  the 
left.  Each  sheet  is  shown  to  the  subject  while  saying  to  him, 
"Which  is  the  longer  line?"  Note  if  his  reply  is  correct  but  do 
not  tell  him.  In  order  to  eliminate  haphazard  replies,  it  is  well  to 
repeat  the  whole  series  at  least  twice.  The  end  is  not  to  discover 
just  how  far  the  accuracy  of  the  child's  glance  may  go,  but  simply 
to  find  if  he  is  capable  of  making  a  correct  comparison  between 
two  lines.  Many  subnormals  are  incapable  of  this;  but  they  act 
as  though  they  were  capable;  they  seem  to  understand  what  is 
said  to  them  and  each  time  put  the  finger  upon  one  of  the  lines 
saying,  ''This  one."  It  is  necessary  to  recognize  those  sub- 
jects whose  errors  are  not,  strictly  speaking,  faults  of  comparison 
but  absence  of  comparison.  It  often  happens  that  the  subject 
constantly  chooses  the  line  on  the  same  side  for  the  longer,  for 
example  always  the  one  on  the  right  side.  This  manner  of  react- 
ing would  be  a  sign  of  defect  were  it  not  that  one  encounters  the 
same  thing  with  some  normals. 

11.  Repetition  of  Three  Figured 

This  is  a  test  of  immediate  memory  and  voluntary  attention. 

Procedure.  Looking  the  subject  squarely  in  the  eye  to  be  sure 
his  attention  is  fixed,  one  pronounces  three  figures,  after  having 
told  him  to  repeat  them.  Choose  figures  that  do  not  follow  each 
other,  as  for  instance  3,  0,  8,  or  5,  9,  7,     Pronounce  the  three  fig- 

«  Cf.  p.  187. 


54  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

ures  in  the  same  voice  without  accentuating  one  more  than  the 
others  and  without  rhjrthm,  but  with  a  certain  energy.  The 
rapidity  to  be  observed  is  two  figures  per  second.  Listen  carefully 
and  record  the  repetition  which  is  made.  Often  the  first  attempt 
is  unsuccessful  because  the  subject  has  not  clearly  understood  and 
commences  to  repeat  the  first  figure  the  moment  he  hears  it;  he 
must  be  made  to  be  quiet,  renew  the  explanation  and  commence 
the  pronunciation  of  another  series  of  figures.  There  are  certain 
subjects  who  can  not  repeat  a  single  figure;  in  general  these  are 
the  ones  whose  mental  condition  is  such  that  they  have  not  under- 
stood anything  at  all  of  what  is  asked  of  them.  Others  repeat 
only  a  single  figure,  the  first  or  the  last;  others  pronounce  more 
than  three.  Special  attention  must  be  given  to  those  whose  error 
consists  in  pronouncing  a  greater  number  of  figures  than  that 
which  is  said,  or  in  pronouncing  a  series  of  figures  in  their  natural 
order.  An  individual  who,  when  asked  to  repeat  3,  0,  8,  replies 
2,  3,  4,  5,  commits  a  serious  error,  which  would  cause  one  to  sus- 
pect mental  debility.  But  on  the  other  hand  it  is  true  that  all 
feeble-minded  and  all  imbeciles  do  not  commit  this  error,  and  that 
many  young  normals  may  commit  it.  Be  careful  to  notice  also  if 
the  subject  seems  satisfied  with  his  reply  when  this  is  obviously 
and  grossly  false;  this  indicates  an  absence  of  judgment  which 
constitutes  an  aggravated  condition. 

Let  us  say,  apropos  of  this  test,  that  it  is  important  to  make  a 
distinction  between  errors  of  attention  and  of  adaptation  on  the  one 
hand,  and  errors  of  judgment  on  the  other.  When  a  failure  is 
produced  by  distraction  it  is  not  very  important.  Thus  it  may 
happen  that  a  subject  does  not  repeat  the  three  figures  the  first 
time.  Begin  again  and  if  he  succeeds  the  second  time  in  retain- 
ing them  he  should  be  considered  as  having  passed  the  test.  A  little 
farther  on  we  shall  have  to  deal  with  tests  of  judgment  properly 
so-called,  and  three  or  four  difficulties  will  be  presented  for  solu- 
tion. In  this  last  case,  failure  will  be  much  more  serious,  be- 
cause it  can  not  be  due  to  inattention  and  the  test  cannot  be 
considered  as  passed  unless  the  solutions  are  given  complete. 


SEBIES   OF  TESTS — 1905  55 

12.  Comparison  of  Two  Weights^ 

This  is  a  test  of  attention,  of  comparison  and  of  the  muscular 
sense. 

Procedure.  Place  side  by  side  on  the  table  before  the  subject 
two  small  cubical  boxes  having  the  same  dimensions,  (23  mm.  on  a 
side)  and  the  same  color,  but  of  different  weights.  The  boxes, 
weighted  by  grains  of  lead  rolled  in  cotton  and  not  perceptible  by 
shaking,  weigh  3  grams  and  12  grams  respectively.  The  subject 
is  asked  to  find  out  which  is  the  heavier.  The  operation  termi- 
nated, two  other  cubes  of  6  and  15  grams  respectively  are  given 
him  to  compare,  and  again  3  grams  and  15  grams.  If  the  subject 
hesitates  or  seems  to  be  going  haphazard,  start  over  again  mixing 
the  cubes  in  order  to  be  sure  that  he  really  compares  the  weights. 

At  the  injunction,  ^'See  the  two  boxes,  now  tell  me  which  is  the 
heavier,"  many  young  subjects  designate  haphazard  one  of  the 
two  boxes  without  testing  the  weights.  This  error,  all  the  more 
naive  since  the  two  are  exactly  alike  in  appearance,  does  not  prove 
that  the  subject  is  incapable  of  weighing  them  in  his  hand  and  of 
judging  of  the  weights  while  exercising  muscular  sense.  One  must 
then  order  him  to  take  the  boxes  in  his  hand  and  weigh  them. 
Some  are  very  awkward,  and  put  the  two  boxes  into  one  hand  at 
the  same  time  to  weigh  them.  One  must  again  interfere  and  teach 
him  how  to  put  a  box  in  each  hand  and  weigh  the  two  simultan- 
eously. 

Additional  remarks.  Following  this  weighing  of  two  boxes  of 
different  weight  and  equal  volume,  one  can  propose  to  weigh  two 
boxes  of  equal  weight  but  different  volume.  The  illusion  which  is 
produced  under  these  circumstances  is  well  known.  With  the 
weights  equal,  the  larger  box  will  appear  lighter;  and  the  apparent 
difference  of  weight  increases  with  the  difference  of  volume. 
Investigations  have  been  made  to  determine  whether  this  illusion 
takes  place  with  backward  children,  and  it  has  been  observed  by 
Demoor  that  there  are  certain  ones  who  are  not  affected  by  it, 
something  which  we  ourselves  have  recently  verified.  We  put 
before  the  defective  children  long  boxes  of  white  wood,  of  the  same 
weight,  the  largest  one  24  x  4  x  4  cm.,  the  smallest  12  x  2  x  2  cm., 
the  medium  one  18  x  3  x  3  cm.  Like  many  normal  children  our 
subnormals,  when  given  two  for  comparison  and  asked  "Which 

7  Cf .  p.  186. 


56  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

is  the  heavier/'  pointed  out  the  larger.  The  first  naive  response 
has  but  httle  significance.  If  one  insists,  if  one  tells  the  subject 
to  weigh  them  in  his  hand,  it  sometimes  happens  that  subnormals 
either  cUng  to  their  first  designation,  or  abandon  it  altogether  and 
find  the  smaller  one  the  heavier;  in  the  latter  case  they  are  sensi- 
tive to  the  illusion.  It  seems  to  us  that  before  declaring  that  a 
subnormal  is  not  sensitive,  one  must  first  find  if  he  can  compare 
two  weights,  and  whether  he  is  able  to  judge  which  is  the  heavier 
of  two  weights  having  the  same  volume.  Having  made  this  pre- 
Hminary  test,  one  will  perceive  that  very  many  subnormals  are 
insensible  to  the  illusion  because  they  are  incapable  of  comparing 
weights.     What  they  lack  therefore  is  a  more  elementary  aptitude. 

13.  Suggestibility 

Suggestibihty  is  by  no  means  a  test  of  intelligence,  because  very 
many  persons  of  superior  intelligence  are  susceptible  to  suggestion, 
through  distraction,  timidity,  fear  of  doing  wrong,  or  some  pre- 
•conceived  idea.  Suggestion  produces  effects  which  from  certain 
points  of  view  closely  resemble  the  natural  manifestations  of 
feeble-mindedness;  in  fact  suggestion  disturbs  the  judgment, 
paralyzes  the  critical  sense,  and  forces  us  to  attempt  unreason- 
able or  unfitting  acts  worthy  of  a  defective.  It  is  therefore  neces- 
sary, when  examining  a  child  suspected  of  retardation,  not  to 
give  a  suggestion  unconsciously,  for  thus  artificial  debility  is 
produced  which  might  make  the  diagnosis  deceptive.  If  a  per- 
son is  forced  to  give  an  absurd  reply  by  making  use  of  an  alter- 
native pronounced  in  an  authoritative  voice,  it  does  not  in  the 
least  prove  that  he  is  lacking  in  judgment.  But  this  source  of  error 
being  once  recognized  and  set  aside,  it  is  none  the  less  inter- 
esting to  bring  into  the  examination  a  precise  attempt  at  sugges- 
tion, and  note  what  happens.  It  is  a  means  of  testing  the  force 
■of  judgment  of  a  subject  and  his  power  of  resistance.^ 

Procedure.  The  proof  of  suggestibility  which  we  have  devised 
does  not  give  rise  to  a  special  experiment:  it  complicates  by  a 
.slight  addition  other  exercises  which  we  have  already  described. 

(a)  Designation  of  objects  named  by  the  experimenter.  When  we 
s,&k  the  child  (test  7)  to  show  us  the  thread,  the  cup,  the  thimble, 

8  In  a  book  specially  devoted  to  Suggestibility  (Paris,  Schleicher,  1900) 
one  of  us  (Binet)  has  described  several  methods  of  testing  for  suggesti- 
bility which  are  valuable  for  application  in  the  schools. 


SERIES    OF   TESTS 1905  57 

we  add,  ''Show  me  the  button."  On  the  empty  table  there  is  no 
button,  there  are  only  the  three  preceding  objects  and  yet  by 
gesture  and  look  we  invite  the  subject  to  search  for  the  button  on 
the  table.  It  is  a  suggestion  by  personal  action,  developing  obedi- 
ence. Certain  ones  obey  quickly  and  easily,  presenting  to  us  again 
the  cup  or  no  matter  what  other  objects.  Their  suggestibility  is 
complete.  Others  resist  a  httle,  pout,  while  feigning  to  hunt  for 
it  on  the  table,  or  in  the  cup;  they  do  not  reply,  but  cover  their 
embarrassment  by  a  search  which  they  continue  indefinitely  if  not 
interrupted.  One  should  consider  this  attitude  as  a  sufficient 
expression  of  resistance,  and  go  no  further.  It  would  be  unneces- 
sary as  we  are  not  seeking  a  victory  over  them.  Lastly,  those  least 
affected  by  suggestion,  reply  clearly,  ''I  do  not  know,"  or  "There 
is  no  button."     Some  laugh. 

(6)  Designation  of  parts  of  a  picture  named  by  the  experimenter. 
When  the  child  has  looked  at  the  picture  and  we  have  asked  him 
to  point  out  the  window,  etc.,  at  the  very  last  say,  ''Where  is  the 
patapoum?"  and  then  "Where  is  the  nitchevo?"  words  that  have 
no  sense  for  him.  These  demands  are  made  in  the  same  manner 
as  the  preceding  ones.  Here  again  we  find  the  three  types,  chil- 
dren who  docilely  designate  any  object  whatever,  others  who 
search  indefinitely  without  finding  anjrthing,  and  again  others 
who  declare,  "There  is  none." 

(c)  Snare  of  lines.  Following  the  three  pairs  of  unequal  lines, 
which  serve  to  show  the  correctness  of  comparison,  we  place  be- 
fore the  subject  three  other  similar  sheets  each  containing  two 
equal  lines.  We  present  them  saying,  "And  here?"  Led  on  by 
the  former  replies  he  has  a  tendency,  an  acquired  force,  for  again 
finding  one  line  longer  than  the  other.  Some  succumb  to  the 
snare  completely.  Others  stop  at  the  first  pair  and  declare,  "They 
are  equal,"  but  at  the  second  and  third  they  say  one  of  the  fines 
is  longer  than  the  other.  Others  find  them  all  equal  but  hesitate. 
Others  again  fall  into  the  snare  without  a  shadow  of  hesitation. 

14'  Verbal  Definition  of  Known  Objects 

Vocabulary,  some  general  notions,  ability  to  put  a  simple  idea 
into  words,  are  all  brought  to  light  by  means  of  this  test. 

Procedure.  Ask  the  child  what  is  a  house,  a  horse,  a  fork,  a 
mamma.     This  is  the  conversation  that  takes  place:  "Do  you 


58  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

know  what  a is?"     If  the  child  answers  yes  then  ask  him: 

"Very  well,  then  tell  me  what  it  is."  Try  to  overcome  his  silence 
a  little  and  his  timidity.  Aid  him,  only  when  necessary,  by  giv- 
ing him  an  example:  '*A  dog,  it  barks,"  and  then  see  if  the  child 
understands  and  approves  that  definition. 

Very  young  normal  children  of  two  or  three  years,  reply  to 
questions  of  this  kind  with  enthusiasm.  They  ordinarily  reply  in 
terms  of  use,  *'A  fork  is  to  eat  with."  This  is  typical.  Record 
the  answer  verbatim.  Some  will  keep  silent,  some  give  absurd, 
incomprehensible  replies,  or  again  will  repeat  the  word,  "A  house, 
it  is  a  house." 

15,  Repetition  of  Sentences  of  Fifteen  Words^ 

This  is  a  test  of  immediate  memory,  so  far  as  it  concerns  the 
recollection  of  words;  a  proof  of  voluntary  attention,  naturally 
because  voluntary  attention  must  accompany  all  psychological 
experiments;  lastly  it  is  a  test  of  language. 

Procedure.  First  be  sure  that  the  child  is  hstening  carefully, 
then,  after  having  warned  him  that  he  will  have  to  repeat  what  is 
said  to  him,  pronounce  slowly,  intelligibly,  the  following  sentence: 
/  get  up  in  the  morning,  I  dine  at  noon,  I  go  to  bed  at  night.  Then 
make  a  sign  for  him  to  repeat.  Often  the  child,  still  not  very  well 
adapted,  has  not  fully  understood.  Never  repeat  a  sentence  but 
go  on  to  another.  When  the  subject  repeats  it  write  down  ver- 
batim what  he  says.  Many  even  among  normals  make  absurd 
repetitions,  for  example:  **I  go  to  bed  at  noon."  Often  the  child 
replaces  the  cultured  expression  **I  dine"  for  a  more  familiar 
form,  "I  eat."  The  fact  of  being  able  to  repeat  the  sentence  cor- 
rectly after  the  first  hearing  is  a  good  sign.  The  second  sentence 
is  easier  than  the  first.  In  the  summer  the  weather  is  beautiful;  in 
winter  snow  falls.  Here  is  the  third,  Germaine  has  been  bad,  she 
has  not  worked,  she  will  be  scolded.  Now  we  give  five  sentences 
quite  difficult  to  understand: 

The  horse-chestnut  tree  in  the  garden  throws  upon  the  ground  the 
faint  shade  of  its  new  young  leaves. 

'  Editor's  note:  Binet's  sentences  vary  in  length  from  thirteen  to  eighteen 
words.  He  has  corrected  this  discrepancy  in  the  1908  edition  by  counting 
the  number  of  syllables  given  in  this  and  kindred  tests.  A  literal  trans- 
lation of  his  sentences  obviously  may  not  contain  the  same  number  of 
words  in  English  as  in  French. 


SERIES    OF   TESTS — 1905  59 

The  horse  draws  the  carriage,  the  road  is  steep  and  the  carriage 
is  heavy. 

It  is  one  o^ clock  in  the  afternoon,  the  house  is  silent,  the  cat  sleeps 
in  the  shade. 

One  should  not  say  all  that  he  thinks,  hut  he  must  think  all  that  he 
says. 

The  spirit  of  criticism  must  not  be  confounded  with  the  spirit  of 
contradiction. 

16.  Comparison  of  Known  Objects  from  Memory 

This  is  an  exercise  in  ideation,  in  the  notion  of  differences,  and 
somewhat  in  powers  of  observation. 

Procedure.  One  asks  what  difference  there  is  between  paper 
and  cardboard,  between  a  fly  and  a  butterfly,  between  a  piece  of 
wood  and  a  piece  of  glass.  First  be  sure  that  the  subject  knows 
these  objects.  Ask  him,  "  Have  you  seen  paper?' '  **  Do  you  know 
what  cardboard  is?''  Thus  ask  him  about  all  the  objects  be- 
fore drawing  his  attention  to  the  difference  between  them.  It 
may  happen  that  little  Parisians,  even  though  normal,  and  eight 
or  nine  years  old,  have  never  seen  a  butterfly.  These  are  exam- 
ples of  astounding  ignorance,  but  we  have  found,  what  is  still 
more  extraordinary,  Parisians  of  ten  years  who  have  never  seen 
the  Seine. 

After  being  assured  that  the  two  objects  to  be  compared  are 
known,  demand  their  difference.  If  the  word  is  not  understood, 
take  notice  and  afterward  choose  more  familiar  language.  "In 
what  are  they  not  alike?  How  are  they  not  alike?"  Three 
classes  of  replies  may  be  expected.  First,  that  of  the  children  who 
have  no  comprehension  of  what  is  desired  of  them.  When  asked 
the  difference  between  cardboard  and  paper,  they  reply,  "The 
cardboard."  When  one  has  provoked  replies  of  this  kind,  the 
explanation  must  be  renewed  with  patience  to  see  if  there  is  not 
some  means  of  making  oneself  understood.  Second,  the  absurd 
repHes,  such  as,  "The  fly  is  larger  than  the  butterfly."  "The  wood 
is  thicker  than  the  glass,"  or  "The  butterfly  flies  and  so  does  the 
fly."     Third,  the  correct  reply. 


60 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 


17.  Exercise  of  Memory  on  Pictures 

This  is  a  test  of  attention  and  visual  memory. 

Procedure.  The  subject  is  told  that  several  pictures  will  be 
shown  to  him,  which  he  will  be  allowed  to  look  at  for  thirty  seconds, 
and  that  he  must  then  repeat  the  names  of  the  objects  seen,  from 
memory.  There  are  thirteen  pictures,  each  6  by  6  centimeters,  rep- 
presenting  the  following  objects:  clock,  key,  nail,  omnibus,  barrel, 
bed,  cherry,  rose,  mouth  of  a  beast,  nose,  head  of  a  child,  eggs, 
landscape.  These  pictures  are  pasted  on  two  cardboards  and  are 
shown  simultaneously.  Measure  the  time  of  exposure  with  the 
second  hand  of  the  watch.  In  order  that  the  subject  shall  not 
become  absorbed  in  one  picture,  say  to  him,  "Make  haste.  Look 
at  all."  The  thirty  seconds  passed,  the  examiner  writes  from  dic- 
tation the  names  of  the  pictures  the  subject. recalls. 

This  test  does  indeed  give  an  idea  of  the  memory  of  a  person, 
but  two  subjects  may  have  very  unequal  memories  of  the  same 
picture;  one  of  them  may  recall  only  one  detail  while  another  re- 
calls the  whole.  Moreover  there  is  a  weak  point  in  this  test  in 
that  it  may  be  affected  by  failure  of  attention.  It  is  sufficient 
that  a  fly  should  alight,  a  door  should  open,  a  cock  should  crow,  or 
for  the  subject  to  have  a  desire  to  use  his  handkerchief  during 
the  thirty  seconds,  to  disturb  the  work  of  memorizing.  If  the 
result  is  altogether  lacking,  the  test  should  be  repeated  with  an- 
other collection  of  pictures  to  find  whether  the  first  error  was  the 
result  of  distraction. 


18.  Drawing  a  Design  from  Memory 

This  is  a  test  of  attention,  visual  memory,  and  a  little  analysis. 

Procedure.    The  subject  is  told  that  two  designs  will  be  shown 

to  him,  which  he  will  be  allowed  to  look  at  for  ten  seconds,  and  which 


DESIGN  TO  BE  DRAWN  FROM  MEMORY  AFTER  BEING  STUDIED  10  SECONDS 

he  must  then  draw  from  memory.     Excite  his  emulation.     The 
two  designs  which  we  reproduce  here,  are  shown  to  him  and  left 


SERIES   OF   TESTS — 1905  61 

exposed  for  ten  seconds.  (Regulate  the  time  by  the  second  hand 
of  a  watch;  the  time  must  be  exact  within  one  or  two  seconds.) 
Then  see  that  the  subject  commences  the  reproduction  of  the  de- 
sign without  loss  of  time. 

Marking  the  results  of  this  test,  that  is  the  errors  committed, 
is  a  delicate  operation.  Simply  note  if  the  reproduction  is  a^bso- 
lutely  correct;  or  if  without  being  correct  it  resembles  the  model; 
or  if,  on  the  contrary,  it  bears  no  resemblance  whatever  to  it. 

19.  Immediate  Repetition  of  Figures 

This  is  a  test  of  immediate  memory  and  immediate  attenti  on 
Procedure.    This  is  the  same  asJor  the  three  figures,  see  abo  ve 
Here  the  errors  noted  for  the  three  figures  take  on  greater  propor- 
tions.    One  must  be  on  the  watch  for  errors  of  judgment.     A 
normal  may  fail  but  the  manner  is  different. 

20.  Resemblances  of  Several  Known  Objects  Given  from  Memory 

This  is  a  test  of  memory,  conscious  recognition  of  resemblances, 
power  of  observation. 

Procedure.  This  test  closely  resembles  test  16,  except  that  here 
resemblances  are  to  be  indicated  instead  of  differences.  It  may 
be  surprising  to  learn  that  children  have  a  good  deal  of  trouble 
noting  resemblances;  they  much  more  wilUngly  find  differences  in 
the  objects  given  them  to  compare.  One  must  insist  a  good  deal 
and  show  them  that  although  unlike  two  objects  may  be  somewhat 
similar.     Here  are  the  questions  to  be  asked : 

In  what  are  a  poppy  and  blood  alike? 

How  are  a  fly,  an  ant,  a  butterfly,  a  flea  alike? 

In  what  way  are  a  newspaper,  a  label,  a  picture  alike? 

Under  test  16  we  have  indicated  the  precautions  that  must  be 
taken,  notably  that  of  assuring  oneself  that  the  child  knows  the 
objects  to  be  compared.  There  are  little  Parisians  who  have 
never  seen  poppies  or  ants. 

(  21.  Comparison  of  Lengths 


This  is  a  test  in  exactness  of  glance  ifi  rs^pid  comparison. 

Procedure.  In  this  test  one  presents  a  series  of  pairs  of  fines. 
One  line  of  each  pair  is  30  mm.  long  and  the  other  varies  from  31 
to  35  mm.    J'hese  lines  are  drawn  on  the  pages  of  a  blank  book, 


62  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

15  by  30  cm. ;  there  are  only  two  lines  on  a  page.  They  extend  in 
the  same  direction,  end  to  end,  separated  by  5  mm.  The  longer 
occupies  first  the  right  then  the  left  of  the  page.  There  are  fif- 
teen pairs.  After  placing  them  in  order  one  begins  by  showing 
the  pair  where  the  difference  is  greatest.  The  subject  is  asked  to 
point  out  the  longer  of  the  two  lines. 

We  then  present,  in  another  blank  book,  a  series  of  pairs  of 
Unes  very  much  more  difficult  to  estimate.  The  pages  of  this 
book  are  20  by  30  cm. ;  the  constant  line  is  100  mm.  long,  the  vari- 
able ranging  from  101  to  103  mm.  The  exact  comparison  of  such 
long  lines  is  beyond  the  ability  of  many  adults.  The  number  of 
pairs  is  twelve. 

22.  Five  Weights  to  he  Placed  in  Order^^ 

This  test  requires  a  direct  concentration  of  attention,  an  appre- 
ciation of  weight,  and  the  memory  of  judgment. 

Procedure.  Five  little  boxes  of  the  same  color  and  volume  are 
placed  in  a  group  on  the  table.  They  weigh  respectively  3,  6, 
9,  12,  and  15  grams.  They  are  shown  to  the  subject  while 
saying  to  him:  ''Look  at  these  little  boxes,  they  have  not  the 
same  weight;  you  are  going  to  arrange  them  here  in  their  right 
order.  Here  to  the  left  first  the  heaviest  weight;  next,  the  one 
a  little  less  heavy;  here  one  a  httle  less  heavy;  here  one  a  little  less 
heavy,  and  here  the  lightest  one.''  This  explanation  is  difficult 
to  give  in  childish  terms.  It  must  be  attempted,  however,  and 
repeated  if  one  perceives  that  it  is  not  understood. 

The  explanation  terminated,  one  must  observe  with  attention 
the  attitude  of  the  child.  One  child  does  not  understand,  puts 
nothing  in  order;  another  arranges  the  weights  very  well  but  does 
not  compare  them;  he  takes  one  at  random  and  puts  it  at  the  left 
as  the  heaviest,  without  comparing  it  with  the  others,  and  places 
those  remaining  without  weighing  them.  A  third  tries  them  a 
little,  but  noticeably  goes  at  it  blindly.  The  reading  of  the 
weights  which  is  inscribed  on  each,  shows  us  the  errors. 

There  are  three  classes  to  distinguish.  First,  the  subject  who 
goes  at  random  without  comparing,  often  committing  a  serious 
error,  four  degrees  for  example.  Second,  the  subject  who  com- 
pares, but  makes  a  slight  error  of  one  or  two  degrees.    Third,  the 

1°  Cf.  p.  220. 


SEKIES    OF   TESTS — 1905  63 

one  who  has  the  order  exact.  We  propose  to  estimate  the 
errors  in  this  test  by  taking  account  of  the  displacement  that  must 
be  made  to  re-establish  the  correct  order.  Thus  in  the  following 
example:  12,  9,  6,  3,  15, — 15  is  not  in  its  place,  and  the  error  is 
of  four  degrees  because  it  must  make  four  moves  to  find  the  place 
where  it  belongs.  All  the  others  must  be  changed  one  degree. 
The  sum  of  the  changes  indicates  the  total  error  which  is  of  eight 
degrees.  It  is  necessary  to  make  a  distinction  between  those  who 
commit  slight  errors  of  inattention,  and  those  who  by  the  enor- 
mity of  an  error  of  6  or  8  prove  that  they  act  at  random. 

23.  Gap  in  Weights 

As  soon  as  the  subject  has  correctly  arranged  the  weights  and 
only  then,  tell  him  that  one  of  the  weights  is  to  be  taken  away 
while  he  closes  his  eyes,  and  that  he  is  to  discover  which  has  been 
taken  away  by  weighing  them  in  his  hand.  The  operation  de- 
manded of  him  is  dehcate.  One  must  note  that  he  does  not  cheat 
by  reading  the  marking  on  the  box.  If  there  is  any  fear  of  this, 
wrap  the  boxes  in  paper. 

24.  Exercise  upon  Rhymes^^ 

This  exercise  requires  an  ample  vocabulary,  suppleness  of  mind, 
spontaneity,  intellectual  activity. 

Procedure.  Begin  by  asking  the  subject  if  he  knows  what  a 
rhyme  is.  Then  explain  by  means  of  examples:  ''Rhymes  are 
words  that  end  in  the  same  way.  Thus  'grenouille'  rhymes  with 
'citrouille,'  because  it  is  the  same  sound  'ouille.'  'Compote' 
rhymes  with  'carotte,'  they  both  end  with  'ote.'  'Baton' 
rhymes  with  'macaron,'  and  with  'citron.'  Here  the  rhyme  is 
on  'on. '12  £)q  yQu  nQ^  understand  what  a  rhyme  is?  Very 
well,  you  must  find  all  the  rhymes  you  can.  The  word  with  which 
you   must  find    rhymes    is    'obeissance.'^^     Come,   begin,   find 

"  Cf .  p.  232. 

^^  Editor's  note:  We  have -here  retained  the  French  words  because  it 
is  obvious  that  the  English  equivalents  would  not  rhyme.  In  using  the 
test  one  must  of  course  use  suitable  English  rhymes. 

1'  Editor's  note:  There  are  many  words  in  the  French  which  rhyme  with 
"obeissance"  and  which  are  perfectly  familiar  to  a  French  child.  This  is 
not  true  of  its  English  equivalent.  One  would  not  think  of  asking  a  child 
to  make  rhymes  with  ''obedience." 


64       '  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

some."  In  order  to  accomplish  this  test,  the  subject  must  not 
only  find  rhymes,  which  is  partly  a  matter  of  imagination,  but  he 
must  understand  the  preceding  explanation,  which  is  a  matter  of 
judgment.  There  are  subjects  who  remain  silent  who  either  have 
not  understood  or  are  unable  to  find  rhymes.  Others  are  more 
loquacious  but  the  false  rhymes  they  cite  prove  that  they  have 
not  comprehended.  The  minute  having  elapsed,  renew  the  ex- 
planation and  try  the  test  again. 

25.  Verbal  Gaps  to  he  Filled 

This  test  thought  out  and  proposed  by  Professor  Ebbinghaus 
of  Berlin,  varies  in  significance  according  to  its  mode  of  use.  It 
consists  essentially  in  this:  a  word  of  a  text  is  omitted  and  the 
subject  is  asked  to  replace  it.  The  nature  of  the  intellectual  work 
by  which  the  gap  is  filled,  varies  according  to  the  case.  This  may 
be  a  test  of  memory,  a  test  of  style,  or  a  test  of  judgment.  In  the 
sentence:  "Louis  IX  was  born  in  "  the  gap  is  filled  by  mem- 
ory.    "The  crow  his  feathers  with  his  beak;"  in  this  the 

idea  of  the  suppressed  word  is  not  at  all  obscure,  and  the  task  con- 
sists in  finding  the  proper  word.  We  may  say  in  passing,  that 
according  to  the  opinion  of  several  teachers  before  whom  we  have 
tried  it,  this  kind  of  exercise  furnishes  excellent  scholastic  train- 
ing. Lastly,  in  sentences  of  the  nature  of  those  we  have  chosen, 
the  filling  of  the  gaps  requires  an  attentive  examination  and  an 
appreciation  of  the  facts  set  forth  by  the  sentence.  It  is  there- 
fore an  exercise  of  judgment. 

Procedure.  We  have  simplified  it  by  suppressing  all  explana- 
tions. The  words  forming  the  gap  are  intentionally  placed  at 
the  end  of  the  sentence.  It  is  sufficient  to  read  the  text  with 
expression,  then  suspend  the  voice  with  the  tone  of  interrogation 
when  one  arrives  at  the  gap.  The  subject  naturally  fills  in  the  gap. 
If  he  does  not  do  so  spontaneously,  urge  him  a  little  by  saying, 
"Finish.  What  must  one  say?"  Once  the  operation  is  set  going 
it  continues  easily. 

The  operator  knows  the  true  words  of  the  text  which  have  been 
suppressed.  He  should  not  yield  to  the  temptation  of  consider- 
ing those  the  only  correct  ones.  He  must  examine  and  weigh 
with  care  all  the  words  that  are  given  him.  Some  are  good,  others 
altogether  bad,  nonsensical  or  absurd.     There  will  be  all  degrees. 


SERIES    OF   TESTS — 1905  65 

Here  is  the  text  with  the  gaps.  The  words  to  be  suppressed 
are  in  itaHcs. 

The  weather  is  clear,  the  sky  is  (1)  blue.  The  sun  has  quickly  dried 
the  linen  which  the  women  have  spread  on  the  line.  The  cloth,  white 
as  snow,  dazzles  the  (2)  eyes.  The  women  gather  up  the  large  sheets  which 
are  as  stiff  as  though  they  had  been  (3)  starched.  They  shake  them  and  hold 
them  by  the  four  (4)  corners.  Then  they  snap  the  sheets  with  a  (5)  noise. 
Meanwhile  the  housewife  irons  the  fine  linen.  She  takes  the  irons  one 
after  the  other  and  places  them  on  the  (6)  stove.  Little  Mary  who  is 
dressing  her  doll  would  like  to  do  some  (7)  ironing,  but  she  has  not  had 
permission  to  touch  the  (8)  irons. 

26.  Synthesis  of  Three  Words  in  One  Sentence^* 

This  exercise  is  a  test  in  spontaneity,  faciHty  of  invention  and 
combination,  aptitude  to  construct  sentences. 

Procedure.  Three  words  are  proposed:  Paris,  river,  fortune. 
Ask  that  a  sentence  be  made  using  those  three  words.  It  is  neces- 
sary to  be  very  clear,  and  to  explain  to  those  who  may  not  chance 
to  know  what  a  sentence  is.  Many  subjects  remain  powerless  be- 
fore this  difficulty,  which  is  beyond  their  capacity.  Others  can 
make  a  sentence  with  a  given  word  but  they  can  not  attain  to  the 
putting  of  three  words  in  a  single  sentence. 

27.  Reply  to  an  Abstract  Question^^ 

This  test  is  one  of  the  most  important  of  all,  for  the  diagnosis  of 
mental  debility.  It  is  rapid,  easily  given,  sufficiently  precise.  It 
consists  in  placing  the  subject  in  a  situation  presenting  a  difficulty 
of  an  abstract  nature.  Any  mind  which  is  not  apt  in  abstraction 
succumbs  here. 

Procedure.  This  consists  in  reading  the  beginning  of  a  sentence 
and  suspending  the  voice  when  one  arrives  at  the  point,  and  re- 
peating, "What  ought  one  to  do?"  The  sentences  are  constructed 
in  such  a  manner  that  the  slight  difficulty  of  comprehension  which 
they  present,  comes  from  the  ideas  rather  than  from  the  words. 
The  child  who  does  not  understand,  is  hindered  less  by  his  ignor- 
ance of  the  language  than  by  his  lack  of  ability  to  seize  an  ab- 
stract idea.  There  are  twenty-five  questions.  The  first  are  very 
easy  and  tend  to  put  the  subject  at  his  ease.  We  do  not  repro- 
duce them  here  as  they  will  be  found  farther  on  with  the  results. 

1^  Cf.  p.  222. 
16  Cf.  p.  224. 


66  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

Here  are  only  four  of  the  sentences.     They  are  among  those  of 
medium  difficulty. 

1.  When  one  has  need  of  good  advice — what  must  one  do? 

2.  Before  making  a  decision  about  a  very  important  affair — 
what  must  one  do? 

3.  When  anyone  has  offended  you  and  asks  you  to  excuse  him — 
what  ought  you  to  do? 

4.  When  one  asks  your  opinion  of  someone  whom  you  know 
only  a  little — what  ought  you  to  say? 

It  is  often  a  delicate  matter  to  estimate  the  value  of  a  reply. 
Sometimes  the  subject  does  not  gather  all  the  shades  of  the  ques- 
tion and  the  reply  is  too  simple,  not  absolutely  adequate  to  the 
demand.  Nevertheless  one  must  be  satisfied  if  it  expresses  sense, 
if  it  proves  that  the  general  bearing  of  the  question  has  been 
grasped. 

In  other  cases  the  reply  is  equivocal;  it  would  be  excellent  if  it 
came  from  a  dilletante,  or  a  decadent,  because  of  the  double 
meaning  which  is  ironically  evoked.  It  is  of  no  value  in  the  mouth 
of  a  school  child.  Thus  to  the  first  question,  ''When  one  has  need 
of  good  advice — "  a  child  rephed,  ''one  says  nothing."  We  sup- 
pose he  has  not  understood  but  if  this  had  been  an  ironical  reply, 
one  might  have  found  in  it  a  curious  meaning.  As  a  matter  of 
fact,  these  uncertainties,  which  are  truly  matters  of  conscience 
with  the  examiner,  present  themselves  but  rarely,  fordinarily 
the  interpretation  is  easy  because  one  knows  already  about  what 
to  expect  from  his  subject^ 

28.  Reversal  of  the  Hands  of  a  Clock 

This  is  a  test  of  reasoning,  attention,  visual  imagery. 

Procedure.  First  ask  the  subject  if  he  knows  how  to  tell  time. 
In  case  his  answer  is  in  the  affirmative,  put  him  to  the  test  because 
it  is  not  best  to  trust  his  word.  There  are  imbeciles  who  say  they 
know  how  to  tell  time  and  give  extravagant  answers  when  a  watch 
is  given  them  to  read.  It  is  important  to  note  this  error  in  judg- 
ment. Having  found  that  the  subject  knows  how  to  tell  time, 
remind  him  that  the  long  hand  indicates  the  minutes  and  the 
short  hand  the  hours.  Then  say  to  him,  "Suppose  that  it  is  a 
quarter  of  three,  do  you  clearly  see  where  the  long  hand  is,  and 
the  short  hand?    Very  well,  now  suppose  the  long  hand  is  changed 


SERIES    OF    TESTS 1905  67 

to  the  place  where  the  short  hand  is,  and  the  short  hand  to  the 
place  of  the  long,  what  time  is  it?"  Reverse  the  hands  for  the 
following  hours:  twenty  minutes  past  six;  four  minutes  of  three. 
The  correct  solutions  are,  half  past  four,  and  a  quarter  past  eleven. 

The  subject  must  not  see  the  face  of  a  watch,  nor  make  the 
design  upon  paper,  or  his  cuff  or  his  nail  to  aid  his  imagination. 
As  the  experiment  is  made  individually,  supervision  is  easy. 

When  the  subject  gives  the  two  solutions  correctly,  one  can 
push  him  a  little  further,  imposing  a  question  much  more  difficult. 
Say  to  him,  'Tor  each  of  the  hours  that  you  have  indicated,  the 
reversal  of  the  hands  brings  about  the  result  that  you  have  found; 
nevertheless  this  result  is  not  altogether  correct.  The  transposi- 
tion indicated  is  not  altogether  possible.  By  analyzing  the  case 
with  care,  tell  me  why.'' 

This  test  permits  of  varying  degrees  of  accuracy  in  the  repUes. 
First,  certain  ones  are  not  able  to  make  any  transposition;  they 
give  no  solution,  or  else  it  is  absolutely  incorrect.  Others  who 
come  nearer  the  truth  give  a  solution  which  is  partially  correct; 
for  example,  only  one  of  the  hands  is  rightly  placed,  or  perhaps 
an  error  of  symmetry  has  been  committed,  one  has  put  to  the 
right  what  ought  to  have  been  at  the  left  or  inversely.  The  third 
category  is  that  of  subjects  who  give  correct  solutions.  Finally 
the  fourth  is  composed  of  those  who  give  a  correct  solution  and 
are  capable  of  criticizing  the  slight  inaccuracies. 

29.  Paper  Cutting^^ 

This  exercise  calls  for  voluntary  attention,  reasoning,  visual 
imagery,  but  not  for  vocabulary. 

Procedure.  Take  two  sheets  of  white  paper  of  the  same  dimen- 
sions. Call  the  attention  of  the  subject  to  their  equality.  ''You 
see  they  are  alike."  Lay  the  first  one  on  the  table,  fold  the  other 
into  two  equal  parts  slowly  before  the  subject,  then  fold  again 
into  two  equal  parts  at  right  angles  to  the  first  fold.  The  sheet  is 
now  folded  in  four  equal  divisions.  On  the  edge  that  presents  a 
single  fold,  cut  out  with  the  scissors,  a  triangle.  Take  away  the 
triangular  piece  of  paper  without  allowing  the  subject  to  study  it, 
but  show  him  the  folded  paper,  and  say  to  him:  "The  sheet  of 

"  Cf.  p.  234. 


bo  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

paper  is  now  cut.  If  I  were  to  open  it,  it  would  no  longer  resem- 
ble the  first  sheet  of  paper  here  on  the  table;  there  will  be  a  hole  in 
it.  Draw  on  this  first  sheet  of  paper  what  I  shall  see  when  I  un- 
fold this  one."  It  is  important  that  the  experimenter  say  neither 
more  nor  less  than  our  text,  and  that  he  compel  himself  to  employ 
the  words  chosen  by  us  although  scarcely  exact  and  accurate. 
The  subject  now  draws  upon  the  first  sheet  the  result  of  the  cut- 
ting which  he  has  just  witnessed.  He  should  not  be  allowed  to 
handle  the  perforated  sheet.  Some  subjects  look  a  Uttle  at  the 
perforation,  others  rely  upon  their  imagination  and  begin  at  once 
to  draw.  The  less  intelHgent  simply  draw  an  angle  placed  no 
matter  where  on  the  white  page,  or  perhaps  a  triangle  whose  form 
and  dimensions  are  not  those  of  the  cut.  A  little  closer  observa- 
tion causes  some  to  consider  the  form  and  dimensions.  Some- 
what better  is  the  triangle  replaced  by  a  diamond  drawn  in  the 
center  of  the  page.  Although  better,  it  is  still  not  the  correct 
result,  for  to  be  correct  two  diamonds  must  be  drawn,  one  in  the 
center  of  each  half  of  the  paper.  This  test  interests  everybody. 
It  requires  no  development  of  style.  It  has  nothing  literary,  and 
rests  upon  entirely  different  faculties  than  those  required  by  pre- 
ceding tests.  Moreover  the  correctness  of  the  result  is  easy  to 
grstde. 

30.  Definitions  of  Ahstradt  Terms^"^ 

This  test  resembles  closely  those  which  consist  in  repl5ring  to  an 
abstract  question.  It  differs  especially  in  that  it  requires  a  knowl- 
edge of  vocabulary. 

Procedure.  Without  preliminaries,  one  asks  of  the  subject, 
''What  difference  is  there  between  esteem  and  affection?  What 
difference  is  there  between  weariness  and  sadness?''  Often  the 
subject  does  not  reply.  He  sometimes  gives  an  absurd  or  non- 
sensical answer. 

We  conclude  here  the  list  of  tests  we  have  used.  It  would  have 
been  easy  to  continue  them  by  rendering  them  more  complicated, 
if  one  had  wished  to  form  a  hierarchy  among  normal  children.  One 
could  even  extend  the  scale  up  to  the  adult  normal,  the  average 
intelligent,  the  very  intelligent,  the  hyper-intelligent  and  measure, 
or  try  to  measure,  talent  and  genius.  We  shall  postpone  for 
another  time  this  difficult  study. 

^^  Cf.  p.  230. 


SERIES   OF   TESTS — 1905  69 

When  a  subnormal,  or  a  child  suspected  of  being  such,  is  ques- 
tioned, it  is  not  necessary  to  follow  the  exact  order  of  tests.  A 
little  practice  enables  one  to  cut  short,  and  put  the  finger  upon 
the  decisive  test. 

The  solutions  given  by  the  subjects  can  be  put  into  four 
categories : 

1.  Absence  of  solution.  This  is  either  a  case  of  mutism,  or  re- 
fraining from  making  an  attempt,  or  an  error  so  great  that  there 
is  nothing  satisfactory  in  the  result.  We  indicate  the  absence  of 
result  by  the  algebraic  sign  minus  (  — ). 

2.  Partial  solutions.  A  part  of  the  truth  has  been  discovered. 
The  reply  is  passable.  This  is  indicated  by  a  fraction;  the  frac- 
tion in  use  is  J.  When  the  test  permits  several  degrees  one  can 
have  i,  or  J,  etc. 

3.  Complete  solution.  This  does  not  admit  of  definition.  It  is 
indicated  by  the  algebraic  sign  plus  (+). 

4.  Absurdities.  We  have  cited  a  great  number  of  examples 
and  insist  upon  their  importance;  they  are  indicated  by  the  ex- 
clamation sign  (!). 

The  cause  for  certain  defective  repUes  can  sometimes  be  grasped 
with  sufficient  clearness  to  admit  of  classification. 

Besides  the  failure  to  comprehend  the  tests  as  a  whole,  we 
encounter: 

1.  Ignorance;  the  subject  does  not  know  the  sense  of  a  word  or 
has  never  seen  the  object  of  which  one  speaks.  Thus  a  child  does 
not  know  a  poppy.     We  write  an  I. 

2.  Resistance  to  the  examination  because  of  bad  humor,  un- 
wilhngness,  state  of  nerves,  etc.     We  write  an  R. 

3.  Accentuated  timidity.     We  write  a  T. 

4.  The  failure  of  attention,  distraction.  We  write  a  D.  The 
distraction  may  be  of  different  kinds.  There  is  an  accidental  dis- 
traction, produced  by  an  exterior  excitant  or  an  occasional  cause. 
For  example,  the  case  of  a  normal  who  spoils  a  memory  test  be- 
cause he  must  use  his  handkerchief.  There  is  constitutional  dis- 
traction frequent  among  subnormals.  We  have  ascertained 
among  them  the  following  types:  Distraction  from  scattered  per- 
ceptions. Distraction  from  preoccupation.  Distraction  from 
inability  to  fix  the  attention. 


7U  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

II.  Pedagogical  Method 

The  pedagogical  method  consists  in  making  an  inventory  of  the 
total  knowledge  of  a  subject,  in  comparing  this  total  with 
that  of  a  normal  subject,  in  measuring  the  difference,  and  in  find- 
ing if  the  difference  in  the  knowledge  of  a  subject  is  explained  by 
the  insufficiency  of  scholastic  training. 

The  first  idea  of  this  method  was  suggested  to  us  by  reading  the 
pamphlets  in  which  Dr.  Demoor  and  his  colleagues  explain  the 
function  of  the  special  school  at  Brussels.  To  this  school  are  ad- 
mitted all  children  ''pedagogically  retarded."  The  pedagogically 
retarded  are  those  whose  instruction  puts  them  two  years  behind 
normal  children  of  the  same  age. 

In  France,  our  ministerial  commission  estimated  that  these 
pedagogically  retarded,  or  to  speak  more  accurately,  these  chil- 
dren lacking  education,  do  not  need  to  be  sent  to  a  special  class; 
being  normal  they  ought  to  remain  in  the  ordinary  schools,  there 
to  make  up  their  instruction.  We  have  thought  that  since  it  is 
of  practical  value  to  make  a  distinction  between  the  normal  who 
is  lacking  in  school  training  and  the  subnormals,  this  distinction 
could  be  made  in  the  type  of  scholastic  knowledge  beneficial  to 
each  of  these  classes. 

The  normal  retarded  child  is  one  who  is  not  at  the  level  of  his 
comrades  of  the  same  age,  for  causes  that  have  no  relation  to  his 
intelligence;  he  has  missed  school,  or  he  has  not  attended  regularly, 
or  he  has  had  mediocre  teachers,  who  have  made  him  lose  time, 
etc.  The  subnormal  ignoramus  is  one  whose  ignorance  comes 
from  a  personal  cause;  he  does  not  learn  as  quickly  as  his  comrades, 
he  comprehends  less  clearly,  in  a  word,  he  is  more  or  less  imper- 
vious to  the  usual  methods  of  instruction.  We  now  have  a 
method  of  recognizing  subnormal  ignoramuses;  this  consists  in 
estimating  at  the  same  time  their  degree  of  instruction  and  their 
knowledge.     Thus  the  idea  of  the  pedagogical  method  originated. 

Having  acknowledged  what  we  owe  to  Dr.  Demoor  and  to  his 
colleagues,  we  must  nevertheless  add  that  these  authors  do  not 
seem  to  appreciate  the  need  of  precise  methods  of  evaluating  even 
among  normals  the  amount  of  retardation  in  instruction.  It  is 
probable  that  in  their  practice  the  amount  of  this  retardation  is 
taken  into  account.  Teachers  do  not  hesitate,  however,  to  make 
estimates  of  this  nature.     They  will  say  without  hesitation  that 


THE  PEDAGOGICAL  METHOD  71 

such  a  child  is  two  years  or  three  years  retarded.     The  value  of 
these  estimates  is  as  yet  undetermined. 

We  have  found  the  following  direction  of  great  value  to  teachers 
who  are  attempting  to  designate  the  subnormals  in  their  school. 
''Any  child  is  subnormal  who,  in  spite  of  regular  or  sufficient 
schooling,  is  two  years  behind  children  of  the  same  age.'^  This 
criterion  fixes  the  ideas  and  evades  some  uncertainties.  But  even 
though  it  constitutes  a  great  improvement  over  subjective  appre- 
ciation, which  has  no  guide,  it  has  still  the  fault  of  lacking  pre- 
cision. It  remains  to  be  seen  what  is  acquired  from  school  in- 
struction by  normal  children  of  different  ages;  one  must  to  some 
extent  make  a  barometer  of  instruction.  On  the  other  hand  there 
remains  to  be  organized  rapid  methods  which  permit  one  to  tell 
with  precision  the  degree  of  instruction  which  a  candidate  has  at- 
1  tained.  These  two  lines  of  research  can  scarcely  be  followed  out 
I  except  by  persons  belonging  to  the  teaching  profession.  We  have 
succeeded  in  interesting  different  distinguished  persons.  M. 
Lacabe,  primary  inspector  in  Paris,  has  consented  to  confide  to  the 
instructors  of  his  staff  the  preparation  of  a  work  designed  to 
measure  the  knowledge  of  his  pupils  in  grammar.  M.  Behr,  pri- 
mary inspector  of  Fontainebleau,  has  undertaken  to  determine 
the  scholastic  attainments  of  the  average  child,  ideally  average, 
of  neither  over  nor  under  intelligence,  of  average  health,  and  who 
has  had  professors  of  average  merit.  The  idea  is  original,  the  at- 
tempt promises  to  be  interesting;  it  will  be  laborious.  Another 
work,^^  entirely  different  in  idea,  is  due  to  M.  Vaney,  school 
director  of  Paris.  It  is  devoted  to  the  measuring  of  proficiency 
acquired  in  mathematics. 

In  considering  the  question  as  a  whole,  it  is  clear  that  the  peda- 
gogical or  instruction  method,  divides  into  two  very  distinct 
categories : 

1.  The  methods  permitting  one  to  evaluate  scholastic  knowl- 
edge including  arithmetic,  grammar,  history,  geography — ^in  a 
word,  all  that  figures  in  the  curriculums  and  can  be  easily 
measured. 

2.  The  investigation  of  knowledge  acquired  outside  the  schools. 
It  is  upon  this  last  point  that  we  invite  the  attention  of  our 

colleagues,  the  teachers.     There  is  a  mass  of  information  that  a 
child  acquires  outside  of  school,  which  figures  on  no  program.     It 

18  See  U Annie  Psychologique,  Vol.  II,  p.  146-162. 


^w 


72  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

is  acquired  by  conversation,  reading  the  paper,  observation  of  all 
that  goes  on  in  the  street,  in  the  house,  everywhere.  It  is  pre-emi- 
nently practical  knowledge,  part  of  it  is  useless,  much  is  very  im- 
portant, quite  as  important  surely  as  that  which  has  a  scholastic 
character. 

We  have  ourselves  recently  begun  a  quest  upon  this  side  of  the 
question.  We  have  made  collective  tests  in  the  school,  asking 
the  children  to  reply  in  writing  to  certain  questions  concerning 
practical  life.  More  than  this,  we  have  asked  teachers  to  put 
questions  individually  to  the  children  upon  points  that  we  have 
designated  to  them.  Here  is  a  little  sample  of  the  nature  of  the 
information  which  every  child  is  to  furnish  of  himself  without  the 
aid  of  anyone. 

1.  What  is  your  name?    What  is  your  first  name? 

2.  What  is  your  age? 

3.  What  is  the  exact  date  of  your  birth? 

4.  How  long  have  you  attended  school? 

5.  What  day  is  today? 

6.  What  month  is  it? 

7.  What  year  is  it? 

8.  What  day  of  the  month  is  it? 

9.  What  hour  is  it? 

10.  Is  it  morning  or  afternoon? 

11.  What  is  the  address  of  your  parents  (street,  number,  apart- 
ment)? 

12.  What  is  your  father's  trade,  your  mother's  trade? 

13.  What  are  the  names  of  your  mother,  brothers  and  sisters 
if  you  have  any? 

14.  Which  are  younger,  which  are  older  than  you? 

15.  Count  this  money.  How  much  is  it?  (Show  12  sous  in 
2-sou  pieces — 1  fr.  80  centimes,  one  piece  of  1  franc;  1  piece  of  50 
centimes,  and  the  remainder  four  single  sous  and  a  2-sou  piece). 

16.  Name  the  colors.  (Squares  of  colored  paper,  vivid  red, 
pink,  light  yellow,  deep  yellow,  orange,  green,  light  blue,  deep 
blue,  violet,  white,  grey,  black.) 

17.  Do  you  read  the  paper?    Which  one? 

18.  Have  you  learned  to  ride  a  bicycle? 

19.  What  is  a  "  correspondance  d'omnibus"  and  what  is  its  use?^® 

^'  Editor's  note:  "Correspendance  d' omnibus"  cannot  be  translated 
into  English  because  the  system  has  no  counterpart  in  this  country.  But 
experience  would  soon  teach  a  resident  of  Paris  the  use  of  this  term. 


THE   PEDAGOGICAL   METHOD  73 

20.  What  stamps  must  one  put  .on  a  letter  sent  from  Paris  to 
Geneva? 

21.  How  much  does  a  loaf  of  bread  cost? 

22.  Describe  how  to  fry  an  egg. 

23.  How  much  does  a  sack  of  charcoal  cost? 

24.  What  do  you  think  is  the  age  of  your  principal? 

25.  Did  you  ever  see  a  cow  milked? 

26.  How  much  does  a  street  car  conductor  get  a  day? 

27.  Have  you  ever  seen  a  goat?     a  frog?     a  rat?    an  elephant? 

28.  Did  you  ever  light  a  fire? 

29.  Do  you  ever  do  several  errands  at  a  time? 

30.  What  is  a  janitor? 

31.  What  is  meant  by  "le  term?"  (Obscure  for  an  American 
but  not  so  for  a  French  child.) 

Sommer,  the  German  alienist,  well  known  for  his  work  of  path- 
ological psychology,  has  indicated  in  a  special  book  the  utility  of 
these  investigations  in  determining  what  he  calls  orientation  in 
time  and  space.  We  do  not  know  what  advantages  he  has  been 
able  to  draw  from  them;  we  are  also  ignorant  of  whether  or  not  he 
has  taken  the  elementary  precaution,  nearly  always  neglected,  of 
first  estabhshing  how  a  normal  child  replies.  Here  are  several 
examples  of  the  information  which  we  have  gathered  in  the  pri- 
mary schools,  upon  the  extra-scholastic  knowledge  of  normals. 

"Correspondance  d^ Omnibus. ^^  In  the  first  class  (from  11  to  15 
years)  there  were  16  boys  who  repHed  correctly — 11  did  not  know, 
and  2  repHed  ambiguously.  In  the  third  class  (from  9  to  14 
years)  4  boys  knew,  28  did  not  know.  In  the  fifth  class  (from  7 
to  12  years)  1  boy  knew,  41  did  not  know.  In  the  sixth  class  (6  to 
9  years)  42  boys  did  not  know.  Here  is  a  test  that  is  good  for  the 
higher  grade  because  the  number  of  correct  replies  is  proportional 
to  the  age. 

Frying  an  egg.  In  the  first  class,  15  children  described  very 
well  the  manner,  and  15  did  not  know.  In  the  sixth  class  10  de- 
scribed it  well,  28  did  not  know,  and  4  had  doubtful  replies. 

Price  of  a  sack  of  charcoal.  In  the  first  class  22  gave  a  reason- 
able price  (2  fr.  50  to  5  fr.) ;  3  gave  unreasonable  prices  (25  fr.,  50 
fr.,  etc.);  4  did  not  know.  In  the  sixth  class,  7  gave  a  reasonable 
price  (2  fr.,  to  5  fr.);  5  gave  prices  too  high  (10  fr.,  50  fr.,  70  fr., 
etc.) ;  11  gave  too  low  a  price  (10  centimes,  1  fr.  80)  and  18  did  not 
know. 


74  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

Know  how  to  ride  a  bicycle.  '  In  the  first  class  15  knew  and  15 
did  not  know.     In  the  sixth  class  13  knew,  and  29  did  not  know. 

Have  you  ever  seen  a  goat?  a  frogf  a  rat?  an  elephant?  In  the 
first  class,  all  had  seen  the  animals.  In  the  sixth  class  of  42  pupils, 
2  had  not  seen  a  goat,  9  had  never  seen  a  frog,  8  had  never  seen 
a  rat  and  3  had  never  seen  an  elephant.  It  is  curious  that  the 
frog  should  be  less  known  than  the  elephant. 

What  is  meant  by  "le  termeV^  In  the  first  class,  14  knew,  and  16 
gave  ambiguous  rephes.  In  the  sixth  class  3  knew,  3  gave  doubt- 
ful answers,  and  36  did  not  know. 

We  hope  soon  to  be  able  to  make  out  a  complete  list  of  items  of 
extra-scholastic  knowledge.  This  is  only  a  sample.  It  will  be 
necessary  to  give  by  ages  the  percentage  of  correct  rephes. 

The  question  is  still  open  as  to  what  extent  extra-scholastic 
knowledge  is  foreign  to  subnormals.  We  can  at  present  only  make 
conjectures  on  this  point.  It  is  probable  that  the  shghtly  sub- 
normal possess  many  of  these  notions  of  practical  life;  perhaps  their 
defect  manifests  itself  especially  in  an  inability  to  assimilate  that 
which  is  properly  scholastic,  and  on  the  other  hand  these  may  be 
quite  apt  in  the  more  concrete  facts  of  every-day  life.  The  ab- 
sence of  this  knowledge  characterizes  especially  true  imbeciles, 
those  who  are  more  seriously  affected.  Not  to  know  either  the 
number  or  names  of  one's  brother  or  sisters,  to  be  unable  to  dis- 
tinguish one's  given  name  and  one's  family  name,  ignorance  of 
the  address  of  one's  parents,  would  constitute  then  a  sufficiently 
serious  sign  of  intellectual  inferiority,  if  this  manner  of  looking  at 
the  matter  is  right,  and  if  there  are  not  extenuating  circumstances 
connected  with  this  ignorance. 

To  sum  up,  the  pedagogical  method  is  two  fold.  It  consists  in 
estabhshing  as  it  were  the  balance  sheet  of  the  scholastic  knowl- 
edge acquired  by  the  child;  on  the  other  hand  it  consists  in  estab- 
hshing the  balance  sheet  of  extra-scholastic  knowledge.  The 
general  result  will  be  found,  not  by  a  complete  inventory — that 
would  take  too  long — but  by  tests  bearing  upon  a  small  number 
of  questions  judged  to  be  representative  of  the  whole. 

The  pedagogical  method  is  somewhat  indirect  in  its  manner  of 
arriving  at  the  state  and  degree  of  the  intelligence;  it  grasps  the 
intelligence  through  the  memory  only.  One  who  is  rich  in  memory 
may  be  poor  in  judgment.  One  even  finds  imbeciles  who  have 
an  amazing  memory.     It  is  right  to  add  that  in  spite  of  this,  these 


THE  MEDICAL  METHOD  75 

imbeciles  are  but  little  instructed,  which  proves  to  us  that  in- 
struction, although  it  depends  principally  upon  memory,  demands 
also  other  intellectual  faculties,  especially  judgment.  One  must 
not  therefore  exaggerate  the  bearing  of  this  theoretic  criticism 
which  we  here  make  upon  the  pedagogical  method. 

The  disadvantages  which  our  use  of  the  method  permits  us 
already  to  suspect,  are  the  following:  in  the  first  place  it  cannot  be 
appHed  to  very  young  children,  of  from  3  to  6  years,  and  it  is 
especially  important  to  point  out  mental  debihty  at  that  age;  in 
the  second  place  it  requires  that  one  should  know  the  scholastic 
attainments  of  each  child.  It  is  not  always  easy  to  see  clearly  into 
the  past  life  of  a  child.  Did  he  miss  his  class  three  years  ago? 
If  he  followed  the  class,  had  he  in  his  temperament,  his  state  of 
health,  his  habits,  special  reasons  for  relaxation?  Was  his  master 
a  poor  one,  did  he  fail  to  understand  the  child?  The  quest  may 
find  itself  face  to  face  with  facts,  which  from  their  remoteness  and 
their  nature,  are  very  diificult  to  evaluate.  These  doubtful  cases 
will  not  be  in  the  majority,  let  us  hope;  but  they  will  present  them- 
selves in  abundance.  M.  Vaney  has  noted  several  in  a  statistical 
study,  which  is  restricted,  however.  Dr.  Demoor^o  finds  50 
doubtful  in  a  total  of  246  retarded  and  subnormal  children;  that 
is  approximately  one-fifth  doubtful.  These  facts  show  that  the 
pedagogical  method  has  its  imperfections.  It  should  not  be  em- 
ployed exclusively. 

III.  Medical  Method 

We  speak  here  of  the  medical  method  considered  in  its  narrow- 
est sense;  we  make  the  improbable  hypothesis  of  a  physician  who 
would  judge  an  idiot  simply  from  medical  signs,  and  without 
attempting,  even  in  the  most  empirical  form,  a  psychological  appre- 
ciation of  the  intelligence  of  the  patient.  We  make  the  suppo- 
sition in  order  to  better  understand  the  proper  field  for  each 
method. 

What  are  then  the  somatic  symptoms  which  the  physician  can 
utilize  for  making  a  diagnosis  of  inferior  mentality? 

There  is,  we  believe,  a  distinction  to  be  made  between  two 
studies,  that  of  the  causes  and  that  of  the  actual  condition.  When 
the  actual  state  has  been  determined,  after  one  has  estabHshed  in 

20  "Les  enfants  anormaux  k  Bruxelles,"  L'Annee  Psychologique,  VII, 
p.  305. 


76  DEVELOPMEN'T   OF   INTELLIGEN'CE 

a  summary  manner  or  by  a  searching  method  that  a  subject  has 
an  inferior  degree  of  inteUigence,  the  physician  plays  an  important 
role,  owing  to  his  special  knowledge;  it  is  he,  who  above  everyone 
else  can  throw  light  upon  the  etiology  of  each  case,  can  determine, 
for  example,  that  the  child  suffers  from  mal  comitial  or  is  afflicted 
with  myxoedema  or  that  his  respiration  is  disturbed  by  adenoids, 
that  his  nutrition  is  weakened,  etc.,  and  that  a  relation  of  cause 
and  effect  exists  between  these  diverse  maladies  and  his  inferior 
intelligence.  The  etiology,  once  determined,  serves  to  guide  the 
prognosis  and  the  treatment.  It  is  not  a  matter  of  indifference 
to  know  the  ill  from  which  the  child  suffers;  if  his  imbecility  is  due 
to  epileptic  causes,  or  rather  consists  in  a  state  of  decadence 
brought  about  by  frequent  attacks,  the  prognosis  is  less  hopeful 
than  if  his  intellectual  weakness  is  the  result  of  traumatism;  in  the 
latter  case,  one  can  hope  that  the  lesion  is  made  once  for  all  and 
has  not  a  progressive  tendency.  But  these  considerations  upon 
the  etiology,  the  prognosis  and  the  treatment,  remain  subordinate 
to  the  study  of  the  actual  state  of  the  intelligence;  and  as  it  is  the 
actual  state  that  we  wish  to  study  here  we  shall  set  aside  every 
other  question  no  matter  how  interesting  it  may  be. 

It  is  very  evident  that  for  a  diagnosis  of  the  actual  state  of  the 
intelligence  the  physician  who  would  rigorously  ignore  all  psychol- 
ogy, would  very  much  diminish  his  resources.  Nevertheless  he 
would  still  have  some  resources  left.  There  are  many  somatic 
symptoms  that  can  be  considered  as  indirect  and  possible  signs  of 
inferior  intelligence. 

What  are  these  signs?  Here,  we  must  first  of  all  dissipate  many 
illusions.  The  subnormal  does  not  of  necessity  constantly  an- 
nounce itself  by  evident  anatomical  defects.  The  physical  de- 
scriptions of  the  idiot  and  the  imbecile  that  one  finds  in  classic 
treatises  are  not  always  correct;  and  even  if  they  were,  they  would 
not  apply  in  the  least  to  morons.  But  the  morons  constitute  the 
majority.  It  is  the  morons  that  must  be  recognized  in  the  schools, 
where  they  are  confounded  with  normals;  it  is  they  who  offer  the 
greatest  obstacle  to  the  work  of  education.  The  diagnosis  of 
moronity  is  at  the  same  time  the  most  important  and  the  most 
difficult  of  all.  Let  us  look  therefore  into  the  methods  to  be  em- 
ployed, to  facilitate  this  diagnosis,  from  the  simple  examination  of 
the  body. 

Medical  Hterature  contains  actually  a  great  number  of  observa- 


THE  MEDICAL  METHOD  77 

tions  which  may  be  helpful  if  they  are  first  submitted  to  organiza- 
tion. A  great  many  anomalies  of  different  orders  have  been 
noted  among  the  subnormals;  anatomical  anomalies,  physiological 
anomalies  and  the  anomalies  of  heredity  and  of  growth.  In  a 
recent  book,  Dr.  Ley^^  has  made  an  excellent  resum^  of  what  is 
known  of  the  diagnostic  signs  of  abnormality,  to  which  he  has 
added  personal  observations  of  his  own.  We  shall  present  to 
the  reader  in  a  rapid  survey  all  that  scientists  have  ever  thought 
to  look  for,  to  examine,  to  analyze  and  to  weigh  among  subnormals. 

We  shall  take  account  only  of  clinical  signs,  that  is  to  say  of 
verifiable  symptoms  upon  the  living  individual;  and  as  we  have 
already  stated,  we  shall  occupy  ourselves  mainly  with  the  recog- 
nition of  moronity. 

A  complete  examination  should  cover  the  following  points. 

Hereditary  antecedents. 

Development. 

Anatomical  examination. 

■P^ceholegieal/ examination. 

^  ^  HEREDITARY   INFLUENCES 

1.  Age  of  parents  at  the  hirth  of  the  child.  Nothing  special  for 
the  backward.     (Ley.) 

2.  Alcoholism  of  the  parents.  42  per  cent  of  the  fathers  have 
manifested  in  different  ways  symptoms  of  drunkenness  and  5.2 
per  cent  of  the  mothers  (Ley).  The  proportion  is  strong,  but 
it  is  not  known  what  is  the  proportion  for  the  parents  of  normals. 

3.  Tuberculosis.  13.3  per  cent  of  the  fathers;  8.1  per  cent  of 
the  mothers;  19.7  per  cent  among  the  grandparents;  18  per  cent 
among  collaterals  (Ley).  The  proportion  is  unknown  among 
normals  of  analogous  social  condition. 

4-  Neuropathic  affections.  (Especially  nervousness,  tics,  trem- 
blings, peculiarities  of  character,  epilepsy,  hysteria,  migraine, 
and  accentuated  neuralgia).  18  per  cent  of  the  fathers;  25  per 
cent  of  the  mothers;  11  per  cent  of  the  grandparents;  4.5  per  cent 
of  the  collaterals  (Ley).  Nothing  is  known  of  the  proportion 
among  normals  of  the  same  social  conditions.  The  heredity  of 
normals  is  so  little  known ! 

6.  Consanguinity  of  the  parents.    Nothing  has  been  observed. 

21  U arrUration  intellecluelle,  Bruxelles,  1904. 


78 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 


6.  The  order  of  the  child  in  the  family.  Of  only  children,  8.1 
per  cent;  first  born,  15.6  per  cent;  last  born  of  large  families  of  five 
children  or  more,  7.5  per  cent;  among  the  last  three  of  families  of 
six  and  more,  15.6  per  cent  (Ley).  Comparison  among  normals 
is  also  here  lacking. 

The  director  of  a  primary  school  in  Paris,  M.  Guilbert,  at  our 
request  consented  to  measure  the  height  of  the  children  in  his 
school  while  keeping  count  of  the  order  of  the  child  in  the  family. 
Here  is  the  table: 


Height  in  Meters  for  Children  Classed  by  Order  of  Birth  in  a  Family 


AGE 

ONLY 
CHILD 

FIKST 

SECOND 

THIRD 

FOURTH 

FIFTH 

SIXTH 

SEVENTH 

13 

1.50 

1.49 

1.34 

1.70 

1.44 

1.51 

1.38 

1.70 

12 

1.44 

1.40 

1.41 

1.40 

1.42 

1.39 

1.53 

1.23 

11 

1.36 

1.36 

1.38 

1.39 

1.31 

1.35 

1.38 

1.42 

10 

1.35 

1.33 

1.33 

1.29 

1.29 

1.31 

1.31 

1.30 

9 

1.30 

1.27 

1.29 

1.30 

1.31 

1.30 

1.22 

8 

1.25 

1.24 

1.23 

1.24 

1.21 

1.26 

1.21 

7 

1.19 

1.19 

1.18 

1.21 

1.21 

1.24 

6 

1.14 

1.16 

1.12 

1.12 

1.10 

There  are  many  irregularities  in  the  figures  of  this  table,  which 
come  from  the  fact  that  the  averages  are  based  upon  a  rather  small 
number  of  children.  For  children  higher  than  the  third  of  the 
family,  the  averages  bear  upon  less  than  ten  children.  In  spite 
of  the  resulting  incoherencies,  one  sees  vaguely  that  an  only  child 
and  those  of  the  third  order  of  birth  are  the  largest  children. 

We  have  had  the  same  calculation  made  for  the  intelligence, 
taking  for  a  standard  the  class  to  which  the  pupil  belongs,  and 
from  this  standpoint  comparing  the  pupils  of  the  same  age  but 
belonging  to  a  different  order  in  the  family.  It  appears  there- 
from, clearly  enough,  that  the  oldest  are  the  most  precocious.  To 
comprehend  the  following  tables,  we  must  understand  that  the 
figures  express  the  average  of  the  classes.  Thus  a  child  belong- 
ing to  the  first  class,  a  second  to  the  second  class,  the  average  of 
the  class  for  the  two  is  1.50.  The  smaller  the  figure  the  more  pre- 
cocious the  child. 


THE  MEDICAL  METHOD 


79 


Precocity  of  Children  Relative  to  their  Order  in  the  Family 

AGE 

ONLY 
CHILD 

FIRST 

SECOND 

THIRD 

FOURTH 

FIFTH 

SIXTH 

2 

14 

1.25 

1.50 

1.50 

1.25 

2 

2 

1 

13 

1.50 

2.40 

2.21 

3.14 

1.80 

3.50 

2 

6 

6 

12 

2.50 

3.33 

3.14 

3.66 

5.14 

4.66 

2.50 

2 

11 

5.45 

5.52 

4.82 

4.36 

5.50 

5 

5 

4 

10 

6.16 

6.92 

6.52 

5.75 

7 

6.50 

7.50 

9 

8.14 

7 

7.95 

7.88 

8.4 

8.75 

10 

.     8 

9.16 

9.28 

9.30 

9.23 

8.75 

8 

7 

9.50 

9.87 

9.80 

9.80   ^ 

10 

It  can  be  seen  that  the  precocity  of  the  child,  (used  as  the  sign 
of  his  inteUigence)  diminishes  very  sHghtly  as  his  order  rises.  It 
remains  to  be  found  if  the  inferiority  of  inteUigence  of  the  later 
born  does  not  come  partly  from  social  influences  such  as  the  pov-, 
erty  and  misery  of  too  numerous  families;  poverty  produces  poor 
nourishment,  lack  of  supervision,  etc.  However  that  may  be,  if 
one  does  not  enter  into  secondary  causes,  it  seems  probable,  that, 
among  normal  children,  being  the  last  of  birth  is  in  itself  an  un- 
favorable factor. 

7.  Mortality  of  brothers  and  sisters.  33.4  per  cent  among  sub- 
normals (Ley) .     The  proportion  is  unknown  among  normals. 

8.  Unnatural  labor.  14.5  among  subnormals  (Ley).  Nothing 
known  among  normals. 


DEVELOPMENT 

1.  Pathological  history.  Convulsions  among  28.4  per  cent  of 
defectives.  Infectious  diseases  having  had  an  influence  over  the 
intelUgence,  9.8  per  cent  of  defectives  (Ley).  The  proportion 
is  not  known  among  normals. 

^.  Retardation  of  dentition.  First  tooth  appearing  after  one 
year,  23.2  per  cent  (Ley). 

3.  Retardation  of  walking.  After  fifteen  months,  50.5  per  cent 
(Ley). 

4.  Retardation  of  speech.  After  fifteen  months,  66.4  per  cent 
(Ley). 

5.  Urinary  inferiority.  Child  wetting  the  bed  at  four  years  and 
after,  22.6  per  cent  (Ley). 


80  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

For  all  this  the  proportion  is  unknown  among  normal  children. 
The  proportion  of  50  per  cent  and  of  67  per  cent  is  so  strong  among 
defectives,  that  we  ask  ourselves  whether  the  speech  and  the  walk 
not  appearing  until  fifteen  months,  does  not  constitute  a  veritable 
retardation.  The  study  of  normals,  unfortunately  neglected, 
would  suffice  to  dissipate  all  doubt. 

ANATOMICAL   EXAMINATION 

This  examination  comprises  two  parts.  First,  that  which  can  be 
measured,  as  the  weight,  the  height,  dimensions  of  the  head,  the 
spread  of  the  arms,  the  biacromial  diameter,  circumference  of 
the  thorax,  the  vital  capacity.  Second,  that  which  can  be  appre- 
ciated without  measurement:  pathological  blemishes  that  are 
more  often  called  stigmata  of  degeneracy. 

A  few  words  only  upon  the  height,  the  measure  of  the  head  and 
the  stigmata. 

Height.  Innumerable  works  have  been  published  upon  the 
height  of  normal  subjects,  of  all  countries,  of  both  sexes,  and  of  all 
ages;22  certain  measurements  have  been  made  upon  the  height  of 
school  children  of  lesser  intelligence  and  these  compared  with  the 
measurements  of  the  more  intelligent  children  (Porter-Gilbert); 
some  studies  have  also  been  made  upon  the  height  of  subnormal 
children.23 

22  For  a  view  of  the  whole  consult  the  article  "Croissance,"  of  Varigny 
in  the  Dictionnaire  de  physiologie  of  Richet.  Several  important  articles 
upon  normals  will  be  found  there.  Quetelet,  AnthropomStrie,  Brussels, 
1871.  See  also  Mimoires  de  V Acad,  de  Belgique,  Vol.  VII.  Burk,  "Growth 
of  Children  in  Height  and  Weight,"  Amer.  Journ.  of  Psychol.,  August, 
1898.  Vitale  Vitali,  Studi  anthropologic!  in  servizio  della  pedagogia,  Turin. 
Gilbert,  Researches  upon  School  Children,  Iowa  University,  1897.  Porter, 
The  Growth  of  St.  Louis  School  Children,  Academy  of  St.  Louis,  1894,  VI, 
p.  325. 

23  Quetelet,  op.cit.,  Mesures  Jaite  dans  la  maison  penitentiaire  de 
Ruysselede.  Berthold,  in  Year  Book,  New  York  State  Reformatory  at 
Elmira,  1898.  Etudes  dans  une  ecole  de  reforme.  Tarbell,  On  the  Height 
and  Weight  and  Relative  Rate  of  Growth  of  Normal  and  Feehle-Minded 
Children,  Proc.  of  the  Assoc,  of  Medic.  Off.  of  Amer.  Inst,  for  Idiot  and 
Feehle-Minded  Persons,  Frankfort,  1881.  Simon,  Recherches  Anthropolo- 
gique  sur  223  gargons  anormaux,  Annee  Psychologique,  1900,  Vol.  VI. 

(See  also  Goddard,  Height  and  Weight  of  Feehle-Minded  Children  in 
American  Institutions,  Journal  of  Nervous  and  Mental  Diseases,  April,  1912. 
— Editor.) 


THE   MEDICAL  METHOD  81 

All  these  documents  go  to  show  that  less  intelligent  children  do 
not  differ  constantly  from  the  most  intelligent  in  their  height  and 
bodily  development.  Gilbert,  among  others,  presents  statistics, 
which  prove  that  there  is  very  httle  difference  between  the  two 
categories  of  children.  On  the  other  hand,  it  has  been  established 
in  the  clearest  manner  by  the  investigations  of  Quetelet,  Tarbell, 
Berthold  and  one  of  us  (Simon),  that  there  exists  a  considerable 
inferiority  in  height  among  subnormals  when  compared  with  nor- 
mals of  the  same  age.  The  average  difference  of  height  shown  by 
the  figures  published  by  Simon,  is  sometimes  more  than  three 
centimeters.  It  is  well  understood  that  one  must  take  the  ele- 
mentary precaution  of  comparing  x)nly  children  of  the  same  age, 
of  the  same  race,  and  of  the  same  social  condition. 

It  remains  to  be  shown  how  one  can  utilize  these  differences  for 
an  individual  diagnosis.  They  are  average  differences,  obtained 
from  calculations  upon  a  great  number  of  measures;  they  are  there- 
fore necessary  in  order  to  know  what  modifications  must  be  ap- 
plied to  render  them  true  for  the  individual.  One  of  us  (Binet) 
has  presented  an  idea  in  regard  to  this  subject, ^^  which  it  seems 
ought  to  take  an  important  place  in  our  medical  method;  it  is  the 
idea  of  limits.  An  analysis  of  the  measures  shows  that  there  exists  j  i  ?  ^  .  ^ ,  > 
alimltoT  height  below  which  normals  are  less  numerous  than  sub-  ^^  \{ 
normals,  and  above  which  normals  are  more  numerous  than  sub- 
normals. This  consideration  of  limits  gives  place  to  conclusions 
more  precise  than  the  consideration  of  the  average.  Let  lis  cite 
an  example,  taking  for  a  standard,  the  measures  which  M.  Boyer 
at  our  request  was  kind  enough  to  make  at  the  Bicetre  upon  the 
idiots,  imbeciles  and  morons  under  Dr.  Bourneville.  For  school 
children  of  14  years,  the  normal  height  is  1.5  meters;  the  height  of 
idiots  of  the  same  age  is  found  to  be  1.37  meters.  This  is  the 
average  obtained.  But  if  one  runs  over  the  individual  values,  he 
sees  that  only  5  per  cent  of  normals  are  to  be  found  below  the 
height  of  1.40  meters,  while  on  the  contrary,  there  are  60  per 
cent  of  idiots,  imbeciles  and  morons.  This  is  the  limit,  not  impass- 
able but  rarely  passed,  and  which  in  an  individual  examination, 
as  we  shall  explain  further  on,  gives  a  prejudicial  presumption. 
But  we  can  treat  this  subject  at  the  same  time  with  that  of  the 
measurement  of  the  head.     It  is  much  more  simple. 

24  Bulletin  de  la  Soci6t6  libre  pour  I'fitude  de  I'Enfant,  p.  430. 


82  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

Head  measurements.  During  recent  years,  a  great  number  of 
measurements  have  been  undertaken,  upon  the  dimensions  and 
form  of  the  head  among  normal  children  of  diverse  intelligence 
and  among  subnormals.  Our  UAnnee  Psychologique  has  already 
published  many  documents  upon  this  interesting  question.  A  his- 
tory will  there  be  found  (Vol.  V,  p.  245),  a  sketch  of  the  technique 
(Binet,  VII,  p.  314)  and  comparative  measures  upon  children  of 
unequal  intelligence,  (Binet,  VII,  pp.  369,  375,  403,  412)  and  upon 
subnormals  (Simon,  VII,  p.  430),  children  of  different  ages, 
(Binet,  VIII,  p.  345), upon  deaf-mutes  (Binet,  VIII,  p.  385),  and 
the  blind  (Biiiet,  368).  The  learned  annual  reviews  of  anthro- 
pology of  Deniker  (UAnnee  Psych.,  X,  p.  296  and  IX)  contain  the 
review  of  several  recent  articles.  From  all  these  investigations  it 
is  seen  that  the  dimensions  of  the  head  are  on  an  average,  a  very 
little  greater  among  the  intelligent  than  among  the  less  intelli- 
gent in  the  schools,  and  that  the  more  intelligent  are  grouped  more 
closely  around  this  average  than  the  less  intelligent.  Among  sub- 
normals, the  preceding  facts  are  again  found  with  a  slight  accen- 
tuation; the  average  values  of  their  cephalic  development  are  a 
little  less  than  among  normals;  and  besides,  they  do  not  hold  so 
closely  to  the  average.  Certain  ones,  the  microcephalic,  separate 
themselves  far  below,  while  others,  the  macrocephalic  are  above 
the  average. 

In  presence  of  these  results,  one  finds  the  same  difficulty  in 
utilizing  them  for  an  individual  diagnosis,  as  in  the  figures  con- 
cerning height.  The  method  which  we  advise  is  the  same:  that  is 
to  establish  a  limit.  To  be  below  the  limit  becomes  a  prejudicial 
characteristic,  or  more  exactly,  an  anatomical  stigma. 

Here  are  the  provisional  limits  which  we  propose  for  subnormals 
(boys).  We  have  fixed  them  for  the  height,  the  anterior-pos- 
terior and  the  transverse  diameters  of  the  head,  and  the  sum  of 
these  two  diameters.  It  can  be  seen  that  more  must  be  done  to 
make  the  work  complete.  One  must  fix  the  limit  for  the  other 
cephalic  measurements,  their  totals,  their  differences,  and  repeat 
this  for  both  sexes. 
...^.^^Ilere  is  the  method  of  utilizing  this  table:  of  120  primary  school 
^  wuld^en  one  finds  3.2  per  cent  whose  height  is  below  the  limit; 
there  are  16.3  per  cent  whose  anterior-posterior  diameter  is  below, 
and  7.5  per  cent  whose  transverse  diameter  is  below;  this  makes  a 
total  of  27  per  cent  but  it  must  be  noted  that  not  one  is  inferior 
for  two  measures  at  a  time. 


THE  MEDICAL  METHOD 


83 


For  a  group  of  100  subnormals  (idiots,  imbeciles  and  morons, 
children  at  the  Bicetre,  all  low  types)  34  per  cent  were  found  be- 
low for  height,  40  per  cent  for  anterior-posterior  diameter,  27  per 
cent  for  transverse  diameter;  22  per  cent  are  below  for  one  meas- 
ure and  33  per  cent  for  more  than  one  measure.  It  would  seem, 
therefore,  that  it  would  be  this  inferiority  considered  in  relation 
to  two  limits,  which  constitutes  the  characteristic  of  subnormals. 

We  have  had  the  curiosity  to  apply  the  same  method  to  the 
measurement  of  defectives  (probably  only  morons,  and  a  few 
ignoramuses)  published  by  Ley.     There  are  51  out  of  187  who  are 

Limits  for  Suhiiormals  (Boys) 


AGE 

HEIGHT 

DIAMETER 
ANT.-POST. 
CEPHALIC 

DIAMETER 

TRANSVERSE 

CEPHALIC 

SUM    OF  THE 
TWO   DIAMETERS 

cm. 

mm. 

mm. 

mm. 

6 

100.0 

164 

133.0 

300 

7 

105.0 

166 

135.0 

8 

110.0 

169 

136.0 

306 

9 

115.0 

171 

137 

10 

120.0 

172 

138 

312 

11 

125.0 

173 

139 

12 

130.0 

174 

140.0 

318 

13 

135.0 

175 

141.0 

14 

140.0 

178 

142.0 

322 

15 

142.5 

179 

143.5 

16 

145.0 

180 

145.0 

328 

17 

147.5 

181 

146.0 

18 

150.0 

182 

147.0 

330 

inferior  to  our  limit  for  anterior-posterior,  and  46  for  transverse 
diameter;  out  of  these  numbers  there  are  20  who  combine  the 
two  stigmata.  These  results  would  be  significant  if  M.Ley  meas- 
ures the  heads  in  the  way  that  we  do.  It  would  be  interesting  to 
know  the  height  of  these  subjects  but  it  was  not  given.  It  has 
been  for  other  subnormals.  The  difference  is  not  great;  there  are 
20  per  cent  of  subnormals  below  the  limit  for  height,  and  only  17 
per  cent  of  normals.  The  limit  is  therefore,  it  would  seem,  an 
anatomic  stigma  less  important  for  morons  than  for  idiots.  Finally, 
among  backward  children  of  the  primary  schools  of  Paris  (mostly 
morons),  measured  at  our  request  by  Mile. Sirugue,^^  who  used  our 

2=  We  desire  here  to  tender  to  Mile.  Sirugue  our  sincere  thanks  for  the 
zeal  and  intelligence  which  she  showed  in  the  execution  of  this  work. 


84  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

technique,  we  find  11  boys  out  of  38  who  are  below  the  limit  for 
the  anterior-posterior  diameter,  only  4  for  the  transverse  diameter, 
and  among  these  children,  4  combine  the  two  stigmata.  The 
7  normal  cases  are  all  above  the  limit.  As  for  the  morons  of  Ley, 
we  find  that  very  few  are  below  the  limit  for  height,  only  4  boys 
out  of  38. 

We  emphasize  these  last  results  because  of  their  exceptional 
importance.  It  is  here  a  question  of  subnormals  actually  found  in 
the  schools  of  Paris.  They  constitute  exactly  the  category  of 
children  that  the  Commission,  charged  with  the  recruiting  of  the 
schools  for  backward  children,  will  have  to  examine.  Therefore 
by  this  topical  illustration,  it  may  be  seen  what  help  may  be 
derived  from  investigating  the  height  and  the  cephalic  dimensions 
of  these  children. 

STIGMATA 

Great  account  is  made  of  these  stigmata,  when  anthropometry 
is  practiced  in  the  same  office  with  medicine.  If  one  takes  the 
pains  to  search  systematically  for  stigmata  among  defectives,  one 
does  not  find  many  more  than  among  normals.  Here  is  a  list  of 
those  which  are  most  frequently  observed : 

Adenoidal  condition.     15  per  cent  of  subnormals  (Ley). 

Tubercular.    Thorax  paralytic  among  60  per  cent  (Ley) . 

Rachitis.     6.5  per  cent  (Ley). 

Syphilis.    3  per  cent  (Ley). 

Defective  nutrition.  60  per  cent  (Ley).  This  high  figure  needs 
explanation. 

Malformations  of  the  cranium.  5  per  cent  (Ley).  One  sees  that 
they  are  rare. 

High  narrow  palate.  60  per  cent.  Reservation  should  be  made 
upon  such  a  high  figure;  it  would  be  necessary  to  examine  the 
condition  of  normals  in  this  regard,  and  above  all,  to  measure  the 
deformity. 

Teeth.  Absence  of  incisors,  10  per  cent  (Ley).  Hutchinson 
teeth  2  per  cent. 

Ears.  The  auricle  like  a  handle,  12  per  cent.  Tubercle  of 
Darwin,  5  per  cent.  Adherent  lobe,  11  per  cent.  Great  simplicity 
in  the  folds  of  the  auricle,  18  per  cent.  Observations  lacking 
among  normals. 

Hair.     Abnormal  masses,  1  per  cent  (Ley). 


THE   MEDICAL   METHOD 


85 


For  the  study  of  these  different  pathological  blemishes,  one 
should :  first,  measure  them,  which  is  possible  for  at  least  certain 
ones;  second,  find  out  the  frequency  of  their  occurrence  among 
normals,  without  knowing  whether  the  subjects  are  normal  or  not, 
in  order  to  be  free  from  auto-suggestion.  Until  these  two  points 
are  elucidated,  nothing  can  be  drawn  from  observation  of  the 
stigmata;  exact  measurement  is  the  only  check  against  the  arbi- 
trary, the  fantastic  and  the  a  priori  methods  of  experimenters. 
One  could  never  have  advanced  the  theory  regarding  the  physical 
type  of  criminals,  if  one  had  measured  the  stigmata. 


PHYSIOLOGICAL   EXAMINATION 

It  must  bear  upon  the  following  points : 

Vision. 

Touch. 

Other  senses. 

Sensitivity  to  pain. 


Respiration  and 
circulatory 
functions 


Respiration. 
Quickness  of  the  pulse. 
^  Blood  analysis. 
Coloration  of  the  skin. 
Tempefature. 


Motor  functions 


General  gait. 

Walking  forward  and  backward,  etc. 

Expression  of  the  physiognomy. 

Strength. 

Motor  ability. 

Tics. 

Quickness  of  movements. 

Speech.     Defective  articulation. 
We  shall  simply  say  a  few  words  about  temperature,  the  analy- 
sis of  the  blood,  and  the  expression  of  the  physiognomy,  regretting 
that  space  is  lacking  to  speak  of  strength  and  the  quickness  of 
movements. 


86  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

TEMPERATURE 

It  is  known  that  subnormals  have  a  slackening  of  the  circulation, 
a  less  rapid  pulse,  hands  cold  and  often  blue.  That  would  be  an 
interesting  sign  for  the  diagnosis,  because  the  taking  of  the  axil- 
lary temperature,  in  tenths  of  a  degree,  among  normals  and  sub- 
normals, the  same  day,  at  the  same  hour,  and  in  the  same  local- 
ity, proves  that  with  the  slightly  subnormals,  morons,  the  ther- 
mometric  inferiority  is  about  0.4  of  a  degree.  (Ley,  op.  cit.,  p. 
77.)  There  would  be  opportunity  here  to  establish,  just  as  for 
height,  a  limit — the  thermometric  limit.  Care  must  be  taken  to 
avoid  causes  of  error  which  are  numerous,  because  the  circulation 
is  influenced  by  many  slight  causes;  the  hour  of  the  day,  the 
temperature  of  the  place,  the  state  of  physical  exercise,  etc. 

EXAMINATION   OF   THE   BLOOD 

This  test  so  often  made,  should  probably  be  rejected.  Recent 
investigation  has  shown  that  the  number  of  corpuscles  contained 
in  a  drop  of  blood  varies  with  the  action  of  the  superficial  vaso- 
motor system,  with  the  constriction  or  the  relaxation  of  the  capil- 
laries affected  by  pricking;  therefore  a  slight  local  condition  causes 
variation  in  the  number  of  corpuscles  and  from  what  can  be  found 
in  a  small  drop  of  blood,  it  is  not  possible  to  draw  a  general  conclu- 
sion as  to  the  richness  in  corpuscles  for  the  blood  altogether.  Let 
us  make  a  comparison.  A  permission;^  a  discharge,  a  holiday, 
any  sort  of  an  order,  will  cause  a  variable  number  of  soldiers  to 
leave  the  barracks;  a  statistician  would  commit  a  great  error, 
if  he  counted,  on  any  day  whatever,  or  at  any  hour  whatever,  the 
soldiers  who  passed  through  the  streets,  and  from  that  estimated 
the  military  force  of  the  country.  It  is  an  analogous  error  which 
is  committed  by  the  counters  of  corpuscles.  In  order  to  render 
the  examination  of  real  value  it  would  seemingly  be  necessary 
to  provoke  a  well  defined  condition  of  peripheral  circulation. 

EXPRESSION   OF   THE   PHYSIOGNOMY 

Few  experimenters  can  boast  of  being  able  to  escape  the  purely 
instinctive  judgment  which  a  physiognomy  provokes;  we  are 
deeply  impressed  by  fine  traits,  mobile  expressions  and  intelH- 
gent  appearances;  a  vacant  look,  an  open  mouth,  an  immovable 


THE  MEDICAL  METHOD  87 

countenance,  give  us  an  unfavorable  impression.  It  remains 
to  be  discovered  what  is  the  real  value  of  the  expression  of  the 
physiognomy,  if  it  is  possible  to  properly  estimate  it,  and  in  case 
this  is  so,  if  it  would  be  possible  to  apply  it  to  individual  diagnosis. 
What  do  authors  think  of  it  ?  Alienists,  who  have  had  to  do 
with  the  gravest  forms  of  mental  deficiency,  do  not  hesitate  to 
affirm  that  the  expression  of  the  countenance  is  deceiving.  Here 
is  what  Shuttleworth  says:^^ 

The  diagnosis  and  the  prognosis  of  the  different  cases  of  mental  defect 
are  so  intimately  united  that  they  should  be  examined  together.  If  we 
consider  the  great  division  of  congenital  and  non-congenital  cases,  we 
shall  be  able  to  note  that  contrary  to  the  current  idea,  the  prognosis  for 
the  former,  as  a  general  rule  is  better  ^than  that  for  the  latter.  In  reality, 
with  the  one  there  is  a  simple  defect  of  development;  with  the  other,  there 
are  lesions  more  or  less  irremediable.  The  superficial  appearances  are 
in  favor  of  the  non-congenital  cases,  while  the  others  are  judged  from  their 
deformed  and  often  repugnant  countenances;  nevertheless  our  experience 
is  altogether  in  accord  with  that  of  Dr.  Langdon  Down  (Obstet.  Trans., 
Vol.  XVIII)  who  says  that  the  prognosis — contrary  to  what  one  often 
thinks — is  unfavorable  if  the  child  is  pretty,  beautiful  to  look  at,  and  of 
seductive  aspect. 

M.  Voisin  is  of  the  same  opinion.  He  observes  that  the  con- 
genitally  affected  are  uglier,  more  deformed  than  the  acquired, 
and  he  repeats  several  times  that  the  latter  may  have  expressions 
of  physiognomy  indicating  a  character  of  intelligence  which  is 
deceptive,  because  they  are  the  relics  of  a  former  period — when 
the  subject  had  not  yet  lost  his  intelligence. ^^  M.  Boumeville 
makes  the  same  remark  in  regard  to  epileptics,  whose  numerous 
attacks  put  them  on  the  road  to  decay.  Truly,  in  generalizing 
this  opinion,  one  would  almost  say  that  the  more  intelligent  idiot 
children  appear,  the  less  they  are  so. 

The  question  would  therefore  seem  to  be  settled  if  other  scien- 
tists had  not  voiced  an  opinion  diametrically  opposite.  Dr.  Ee- 
moor  attaches  great  importance  to  the  study  of  the  play  of  the 
countenance  in  defectives;  he  believes  the  expression  is  very 
significant  and  he  does  not  hesitate  to  say  that  the  diagnosis  will 
have  there  a  much  surer  support,  than  in  cephalometry.  We 
shall  not  discuss  his  opinion  regarding  cephalometry,  since  the 
facts  that  we  have  above  presented  are  of  a  nature  to  show 

2^  Les  enfants  anormaux  au  point  de  vue  mental,  p.  78,  Brussels,  1904. 
27  Legons  sur  Vidiotie,  pp.  82  and  83. 


88  DEjVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

whether  he  was  self-deceived.  But  we  believe  it  is  interesting  to 
retain  what  he  has  said  upon  the  countenance.  Does  it  seem  to 
disagree  with  Shuttleworth,  Voisin,  and  Bourneville?  In  the 
letter,  yes;  as  to  fundamentals,  no.  It  seems  possible  for  us  to 
reconcile  all  these  views  as  follows.  These  observers  were  famil- 
iar with  different  types  of  subjects.  As  regards  the  idiot  un- 
doubtedly it  is  Voisin  who  is  right;  the  countenance  is  deceptive. 
As  regards  the  moron,  who  forms  the  majority  of  the  children 
in  the  school  of  Brussels,  to  which  Demoor  is  attached,  it  is  very 
probable  that  the  contrary  is  true;  the  physiognomy  reveals  the 
degree  of  intelligence. 

We  do  not  propose  this  conciliatory  solution,  in  consequence  of 
a  priori  reasoning.  It  has  been  inspired  in  us  by  the  results  of 
an  investigation  which  we  have  recently  confided  to  Mme.  Rous- 
son,  pubhc  school  teacher  in  Paris.  At  our  request,  M.  Bertillon 
has  been  good  enough  to  photograph  for  us  some  hundred  sub- 
normals, of  the  primary  school  taken  at  random,  along  with  some 
fifty  normals. ^^  It  was  with  this  collection  that  Mme.  Rousson 
experimented;  she  had  some  seventy  persons  make  the  diagnosis, 
as  to  whether  judged  by  his  photograph  the  child  was  normal  or 
subnormal.  The  teachers  gave  80  per  cent  of  correct  replies, 
thus  showing  in  the  clearest  manner,  that  the  countenance  is 
scarcely  deceptive  for  those  who  are  used  to  reading  it;  20  per 
cent  of  errors  is  a  very  insignificant  proportion,  being  about  the 
same  that  Crepieux-Jamin  obtains  when  he  searches  for  intelli- 
gence by  means  of  the  hand-writing.  These  results  which  we 
give  here  en  gros,  and  which  confirm  the  opinion  of  Demoor,  show 
of  how  great  utility  would  be  the  precise  analysis  of  physiognomy. 
There  is  here  a  technique  to  be  created.  We  hope  sincerely 
that  we  shall  be  able  to  bring  the  question  to  a  conclusion  with 
the  collaboration  of  Mme.  Rousson,  who  is  deeply  interested  in 
these  studies. 

In  terminating  this  brief  sketch  of  the  medical  examination, 
let  us  insist  upon  the  method  to  be  followed  in  such  an  exami- 
nation. We  have  not  yet  sufficiently  developed  our  ideas  on  the 
subject.     It  is  understood  that  one  must  force  oneself  to  support 

28  This  was  a  great  undertaking,  full  of  all  sorts  of  difficulties;  it  was 
successful,  thanks  to  the  energy  and  tact  of  Inspector  Belot,  and  to  the 
zeal  of  a  great  number  of  instructors. 


THE   MEDICAL   METHOD  89 

one's  reasoning  by  objective  facts,  that  can  be  verified  by  all 
and  are  often  measurable.  One  must  guard  carefully  against 
intuition,  subjectivism,  gross  empiricism,  decorated  by  the  name 
of  medical  tact,  and  behind  which  ignorance,  carelessness,  and 
presumption,  hide  themselves.  Every  medical  diagnosis  which 
cannot  be  proved  as  one  proves  a  sum  in  addition,  is  to  be  rejected. 
The  diagnosis  must  rest  upon  the  utiHzation  of  different  signs, 
several  types  of  which  we  have  enumerated  in  the  preceding 
pages.  We  must  in  the  first  place  come  to  an  agreement  upon 
the  value  of  these  signs;  which  must  be  fixed,  without  any  pre- 
conceived idea;  and  the  only  means  of  fixing  this  value  is  to  make 
a  comparative  study  of  the  normal  state.  It  is  a  guiding  princi- 
ple which  is  too  often  forgotten  in  medicine.  It  is  nevertheless 
so  important,  so  fertile  in  consequences,  that  an  alienist  would 
certainly  distinguish  himself,  if  he  did  no  more  than  force  into 
the  minds  of  his  contemporaries,  the  idea  that  the  study  of  the 
subnormal  is  not  possible  except  by  a  comparison  with  the  normal. 
Here,  in  our  studies  upon  children,  it  is  not  simply  a  comparison 
that  is  necessary,  it  is  a  physiological,  anatomical  and  anthro- 
pological barometer  to  which  one  must  return  every  time  with 
each  new  subject  to  find  out  in  what  measure  this  subject  is  in- 
ferior to  the  normal. 

In  the  second  place,  there  must  be  estabhshed  in  the  series  of 
measurable  signs,  certain  limits,  which  will  demarcate  the  stig- 
mata. We  have  already  described  the  stigmata  of  height,  of 
the  head,  of  the  temperature,  etc.  We  shall  not  repeat  our- 
selves. 

In  the  third  place,  judging  from  the  comparative  frequency  of 
the  stigmata  among  normals  and  subnormals,  a  calculation 
must  be  devised  which  will  express  the  presumable  amount  of 
retardation  which  each  stigma  contains.  In  other  words,  we 
must  be  able  to  attach  a  coefficient  of  importance  to  each  one  of 
these  stigmata.  What  is  the  meaning  of  a  height  below  the 
limit?  What  must  be  inferred  from  an  arched  palate?  What 
count  must  be  made  of  an  axillary  temperature  0.8  of  a  degree 
below  normal?  What  importance  is  to  be  given  to  an  alcoholic 
father  and  a  tuberculous  mother? 

This  is  the  principle  of  calculation  which  we  propose. 
Suppose  that  a  certain  stigma,  is  to  be  found  always  with  the 
subnormal,  never  with  the  normal.     It  would  have  the  value  of 


90  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

100  per  cent.  Suppose  that  a  second  stigma  is  to  be  found  with 
all  subnormals  and  with  50  per  cent  of  normals,  it  will  be  twice 
as  common  with  the  first,  and  it  would  have  then  the  value  of 
50  per  cent.  Suppose  a  third  is  to  be  found  with  12  subnormals 
and  6  normals,  it  will  again  have  the  value  of  50  per  cent  although 
its  absolute  frequency  should  be  much  less.  If  100  convention- 
ally represents  the  certainty,  the  smaller  numbers  measure 
inferior  degrees  of  certainty,  down  to  0  which  represents  the 
cornplete  absence  of  the  indication,  and  to  the  negative  quantities 
which  represent  the  indication  of  the  opposite  sense. 

To  sum  up,  we  can  utilize  three  methods  for  the  diagnosis  of 
the  intellectual  level  among  subnormals. 

1.  The  psychological  method  which  is  almost  always  applicable 
and  which  is  almost  certain  to  reveal  the  signs  of  defect;  the  diffi- 
culty being  in  the  execution  of  the  tests  which  demand  in  the 
experimenter  a  great  facihty  in  experimental  psychology. 

2.  The  pedagogical  method  which  is  very  frequently  applicable, 
and  which  reveals  probable  signs  of  defect. 

3.  The  medical  method  which  is  applicable  only  in  a  restricted 
number  of  cases,  and  which  reveals  possible  signs  of  defect. 

A.  BiNET  AND  Th.  Simon. 


APPLICATION  OF  THE  NEW  METHODS  TO  THE 
DIAGNOSIS  OF  THfi  INTELLECTUAL  LEVEL  AMONG 
NORMAL  AND  SUBNORMAL  CHILDREN  IN  INSTITU- 
TIONS AND  IN  THE  PRIMARY  SCHOOLS 

The  preceding  article  contains  a  strictly  theoretical  exposition 
of  the  methods  of  diagnosis  which  we  have  devised  for  recognizing 
and  measuring  intellectual  inferiority.  It  remains  to  complete 
the  preliminary  work,  to  standardize  it,  to  show  how  far  these 
methods  work  out  when  applied  to  real  facts.  After  the  theory 
must  come  the  proof. 

It  will  not  be  a  question  here  of  anything  but  the  psychological 
method.  It  is  the  only  one  which  is  ripe  for  complete  practical 
purposes.  Other  methods  can  only  give  accessory  indications; 
but  these  already  permit  determinations  of  intellectual  inferior- 
ity. This  is  our  conviction;  we  are  now  going  to  give  the  pal- 
pable denionstration. 

The  psychological  examination  of  a  subject  lasts  on  an  average 
40  minutes.  We  made  in  the  beginning  many  useless  tests  with 
each  child,  because  we  were  doing  a  work  of  investigation;  we 
were  groping;  now  that  one  knows  what  to  look  for,  one  can  pro- 
ceed more  rapidly,  and  we  believe  that  a  half-hour  will  suffice 
to  fix  the  state  of  the  intellectual  development  of  each  child. 

We  shall  study  successively  with  our  measuring  scale  of  intelli- 
gence: 

1.  Normals. 

2.  Subnormals  in  institutions. 

3.  Subnormals  in  primary  schools. 

I.  Normal  Development  of  the  Intelligence  with  Children 
FROM  Three  to  Twelve  Years  Old 

Normals  figure  here  as  terms  of  comparison.  We  have  been 
obliged  to  make  these  lengthy  studies,  because,  up  to  the  present, 
nothing  of  the  kind  existed.  So  far  as  we  know,  there  is  no  work 
that  contains  the  precise  and  detailed  history  of  the  development 
of  the  intelligence  of  a  child.     The  most  complete  monographs 

91 


92  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

like  those  of  Allen  Gilbert^  present  a  series  of  practical  tests, 
especially  upon  sensation  and  the  organs  of  sense,  but  they  almost 
always  leave  the  intelligence  out  of  the  question;  there  are,  never- 
theless, very  suggestive  observations  which  have  been  published 
here  and  there,  ^  but  we  have  not  been  able  to  utilize  them,  pre- 
ferring to  erect  a  new  structure  borrowing  material  from  no  one. 

When  the  work,  which  is  here  only  begun,  shall  have  taken 
its  definite  character,  it  will  doubtless  permit  the  solution  of 
many  pending  questions,  since  we  are  aiming  at  nothing  less  than 
the  measure  of  the  intelligence;  one  will  thus  know  how  to  com- 
pare the  different  intellectual  levels  not  only  according  to  age, 
but  according  to  sex,  the  social  condition,  and  to  race;  applications 
of  our  method  will  be  found  useful  to  normal  anthropology,  and 
also  to  criminal  anthropology,  which  touches  closely  upon  the 
study  of  the  subnormal,  and  will  receive  the  principal  conclusion 
of  our  study. 

These  investigations  have  been  made  by  ourselves  personally; 
in  spite  of  their  statistical  appearance,  they  are  the  results  of 
experiments  pursued  during  long  periods  upon  isolated  children. 
We  felt  that  we  could  not  trust  this  matter  to  anyone;  and  we 
vouch  for  all  that  we  report,  having  been  ourselves  the  constant 
observers. 

We  did  not  know  a  single  child;  they  appeared  to  us  for  the 
first  when  they  came  to  the  examination.  We  knew,  however, 
that  all  were  normal.  The  masters  were  asked  to  designate  only 
children  of  average  intelligence,  who  were  neither  in  advance 
of  nor  behind  children  of  their  own  age,  and  who  attended  the 
grade  correct  for  their  years.  This  prescription  was  carefully 
followed  in  the  Primary  school;  evidently  it  was  less  easy  to  con- 
form to  this  rule  in  the  Maternal  school,  because  of  the  tender 
age  of  the  children;  finally,  we  required  that  the  subjects  chosen 
should  have  an  exact  number  of  years  in  order  that  the  develop- 
ment should  be  typical  of  each  age. 

^  Allen  Gilbert,  Researches  upon  School  Children  and  College  Students, 
University  of  Iowa,  studies  in  Psychology,  edited  by  G.  T.  W.  Patrick,  pp. 
1-39. 

2  We  know  of  nothing  general,  outside  the  books  often  cited,  of  Preyer, 
Perex,  Sully,  Shinn,  etc.,  which  are  either  monographs,  or  collections  of 
anecdotes;  there  are  also  scattered  notes  in  special  collections  like  the 
Pedagogical  Seminary  of  Stanley  Hall. 


NORMAL   CHILDREN   OF   THREE   YEARS  93 

The  tests  took  place  in  the  office  of  the  Director  or  Directress 
of  the  school,  and  in  their  presence.  We  have  chosen  those 
schools  where  the  office  was  sufficiently  removed  from  the  classes, 
to  enjoy  a  silence  undisturbed  by  the  melodious  chants  of  the 
children  learning  to  spell.  Let  us  add  That  we  have  chosen  our 
Directors  and  Directresses  from  among  those  who  best  understood 
that  it  was  a  question  of  making  scientific  observations,  and  that 
it  was  not  wise  to  intervene  during  a  test  to  whisper  a  reply  to 
the  pupil. 

In  our  first  attempt  we  were  satisfied  to  make  observations  upon 
ten  children  of  the  Maternal  school,  and  fifteen  of  the  Primary 
school,  in  order  to  fix  the  mental. capacity  of  each  age.  These 
restricted  numbers  gave  a  first  estimate.  Later  we  made  more 
numerous  observations,  which  are  still  being  continued.  To 
illustrate  our  method,  we  shall  simply  describe  the  results  ob- 
tained from  some  fifty  children.  But  it  must  be  understood 
that  these  results  have  their  special  significance  which  we  shall 
justify  in  a  later  publication. 

NORMAL  CHILDREN  OF  THREE  YEARS 

The  questionings  and  the  presentation  of  the  tests  offered 
many  difficulties.  We  seated  the  children  beside  us  at  a  table. 
We  said  good  morning  to  them,  making  them  welcome.  Many 
children  of  this  age  remain  silent  and  will  not  reply,  even  to  a 
question  which  they  understand.  This  mutism  is  partly  caused 
by  timidity,  the  proof  of  which  is  that  certain  children  during  the 
examination  pull  their  fingers  and  roll  up  their  aprons  with  a 
rapid  motion;  the  silence  of  others  is  partly  caused  by  ill-will, 
stubbornness  or  malice.  One  of  this  latter  class  persisted  for 
several  minutes  in  incorrect  replies;  we  showed  him  a  string  and 
asked  ''Is  this  string?"  He  shook  his  head  in  sign  of  negation; 
and  when  we  asked  him  regarding  other  objects,  a  cup,  a  button, 
a  thimble,  ''Is  that  string?''  he  nodded  affirmation.  In  spite 
of  these  difficulties  of  psychological  examination,  it  is  still  possible 
to  accomplish  it  on  condition  that  one  does  not  offend  the  chil- 
dren and  is  willing  to  wait  a  little.  If  the  child  does  not  wish  to 
reply  to  one  test  we  present  another;  we  have  always  succeeded 
finally  in  loosening  their  tongues.  When  necessary,  if  the  timid- 
ity or  bad  humor  of  the  child  continues,  one  could  put  off  the 


94  DEVELOPMEN'T   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

examination  to  another  time;  we  have  not,  however,  as  yet  had 
to  resort  to  this  extreme  measure.  Our  subjects  have  never  been 
loquacious,  they  showed  no  spontaneity.  We  felt  they  could  have 
done  better  than  they  did.  The  examination  makes  them  in  a 
certain  way  seem  less  intelligent  than  they  are;  and  this  is  cer- 
tainly a  general  rule.  The  simple  fact  of  being  put  upon  the 
witness  stand,  so  to  speak,  in  school,  by  a  gentleman  who  has  the 
age  and  appearance  of  a  professor,  would  naturally  inspire  an 
attitude  of  reserve,  and  change  very  much  the  apparent  attitude 
of  a  child;  a  fine  little  fellow  of  twelve,  who  sits  decently  upon 
his  stool,  with  tranquil  countenance,  brows  knit,  and  exchanges 
politely  his  smile  with  ours,  will  become,  an  hour  later,  a  street 
urchin  making  sport  of  the  passers  by.  Each  one  takes,  during 
the  examination,  a  scholastic  attitude,  which  is  slightly  artificial; 
the  moral  character,  the  sentiments  of  the  child  are  very  much 
changed,  his  intellectual  capacity  is  probably  less  affected  except 
that  he  loses  much  of  his  spontaneity. 

We  omit  the  first  tests  for  normal  children  of  three  years. 
Since  they  bring  their  lunch  to  the  Maternal  school,  and  do  not 
have  to  be  fed,  it  is  needless  to  investigate  their  knowledge  of  food. 
They  also  understand  gestures,  simple  sentences,  since  they 
reply  to  our  greeting,  enter  and  seat  themselves  in  order.  Let  us 
mention  at  once  a  characteristic  of  the  intellectual  development 
of  a  child  of  three  years:  it  is  that  he  has  a  verbal  knowledge  of 
things.  First,  of  the  body;  all  show,  when  asked,  nose,  eye, 
mouth,  ear,  foot,  forehead.  There  is  a  slight  hesitation,  at  times, 
for  the  eyebrow;  and  sometimes  an  abdominal  locahzation  for  the 
heart  is  given.  Naturally  the  three  objects:  cup,  string,  and 
thimble  are  correctly  designated  when  we  call  them  by  their 
name.  The  test  of  pictures  is  the  one  which  interests  the  children 
most;  this  works  equally  well,  when  we  name  the  object  and  the 
child  must  find  it,  or  when,  on  the  contrary,  we  point  out  the 
object  and  the  child  gives  the  name.  In  the  latter  case  there  is 
a  slight  difficulty  of  interpretation,  because  one  cannot  always 
understand  the  word  which  the  child  pronounces,  either  because 
it  is  badly  pronounced,  err  because  he  uses  a  special  pronunciation 
of  which  we  have  no  key.  Setting  this  slight  difficulty  aside, 
the  test  shows  clearly  that  a  child  of  three  years  passes  without 
difl&culty  from  the  perception  of  the  picture  to  the  name;  or  from 
the  name  to  the  picture. 


NORMAL  CHILDREN"  OF  THREE  YEARS  95 

The  objects  found  in  the  picture,  when  we  name  them  to  the 
child,  are  the  window,  the  mother,  the  Httle  girl,  the  broom,  the 
feather  duster,  the  pot  of  flowers,  the  basket,  the  coffee  pot. 
When  the  child  names  by  himself,  he  designates  the  little  girl, 
the  dog,  the  boy,  the  man,  the  other  man;  he  sometimes  names 
them  in  his  own  way;  the  little  girl  is  called  a  baby;  one  child  said 
"Lucy" — the  dog  is  called  a  'Houtou;'^  the  man  an  "old  fellow;" 
the  street  lamplighter  is  recognized  as  a  "gas  lighter;"  sometimes 
through  error  of  perspective  he  is  called  "a  baby"  because  he  is 
very  small.  The  sky  is  called  "house,"  and  the  advertisement  a 
box  or  a  thing  ''machin." 

It  is  worth  remarking  that  children  of  this  age  are  often  eager 
to  name  or  designate  something,  no  matter  what.  These  errors 
of  designation  which  are  frequent  enough,  because  no  one  child 
correctly  names  or  designates  all  of  the  series  of  objects,  are  due 
partly  to  the  fact  that  he  is  ignorant  of  the  names  of  certain  things, 
like  the  coffee  pot,  for  instance,  but  still  more  frequently  they  are 
due  to  a  lack  of  attention. 

Children  of  this  age  show  a  tendency  to  point  at  random.  One 
must  at  times  chide  them  a  little  to  bring  out  a  correct  desig- 
nation, which  proves  that  they  know  very  well,  but  are  careless. 

It  will  not  therefore  be  surprising  to  find  that  they  are  very 
susceptible  to  suggestion.  If  one  asks  for  the  button  (which  is 
not  on  the  table)  they  will  indicate  another  object,  book,  box, 
or  a  distant  object  which  they  vaguely  point  out  with  the  finger. 
If  one  asks,  when  they  are  looking  at  the  picture,  for  the  "pata- 
poum"  or  the  "nitchevo,"  none  of  them  say  distinctly  "I  don't 
know."  They  always  point  out  something,  preferably  a  small 
object,  like  a  cup,  a  candle,  a  coffee  mill,  but  never  a  person.         ^ 

To  summarize :  the  equipment  of  a  child  of  three  years  is  verbal 
knowledge  of  objects,  and  particularly  parts  of  the  body,  familiar 
objects,  and  objects  represented  in  pictures;  correct  designation 
and  naming  of  the  majority  of  objects  in  a  series,  but  never  all; 
frequent  errors  through  distraction,  and  a  tendency  to  point  at 
random;  finally  extreme  suggestibility,  which  manifests  itself 
in  the  act  of  pointing  out  something  when  one  names  an  object  . 
known  but  absent,  or  when  one  pronounces  a  strange  word. 

For  the  other  tests,  the  results  are  not  so  good;  in  exceptional 
cases  certain  precocious  children  succeed  but  the  majority  fail. 
At  three  years,  they  do  not  repeat  three  figures.     We  never 


96  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

obtain  but  one  or  two  figures  correctly  repeated — occasionally 
three,  but  so  badly  pronounced,  so  muttered  that  it  requires  a 
very  indulgent  ear  to  recognize  anything.  In  no  case  do  they 
invent  a  series  of  figures.  The  comparison  of  two  unequal  lines 
presents  the  same  difficulty.  With  the  exception  of  an  occasional 
child,  the  others  do  not  understand  the  sense  of  the  experiment, 
and  perhaps  not  of  the  words;  what  they  understand  is  that 
they  must  point  out  a  line,  and  bravely  they  put  their  index 
finger  upon  one  of  them;  generally  they  put  their  finger  always 
to  the  same  side.  The  comparison  of  two  weights  succeeds  no 
better.  To  the  question,  ''Which  is  the  heavier  weight?"  they 
comprehend  vaguely,  as  for  the  lines,  that  they  must  designate 
something;  but  they  cannot  weigh  them  in  their  hand,  even  when 
shown  how.  We  are  no  more  successful  for  the  definition  of 
common  objects,  as  horse,  fork,  etc.  Without  doubt,  these 
children  know  the  objects,  but  they  are  prevented  by  the  difficulty 
of  expressing  their  thought  in  a  sentence.  With  the  exception  of 
a  precocious  child, — who  cannot  represent  the  normal  level — 
they  are  silent,  or  else  repeat  the  question,  ''What  is  a  fork?" 
"It  is  a  fork." 

These  first  gropings,  these  mistakes,  these  infantile  forms  of 
reaction,  present  for  psychology  the  interest  of  curiosity;  all 
this  is  similar  to  what  is  given  by  defectives  who  are  older.  But 
so  far  as  our  measuring  scale  is  concerned,  it  is  a  negligible  quantity. 
All  that  should  be  kept  in  mind  is  this: 
f  The  child  of  three  years,  although  inattentive  and  very  suggestible, 
names,  or  recognizes  from  the  name,  the  majority  of  the  things  that 
figure  in  our  series  of  objects  and  pictures. 

At  three  years  a  child  has  then  the  faculty  of  naming  objects. 

CHILDREN   OF   FIVE   YEARS 

These  children  presented  fewer  difficulties  in  examination  than 
those  of  three  years.  There  was  one,  however,  the  young  R., 
who  began  to  pout  in  the  midst  of  the  examination  and  was  un- 
willing to  reply  to  a  series  of  questions.  The  reflections  which 
we  made  upon  the  difficulty  of  questioning  children  of  three  years, 
can  be  repeated  here,  with  slight  modification.  Between  three 
and  five  years  an  enormous  distance  has  been  traversed.  Need- 
less to  say  that  at  five  years  the  objects  and  pictures  of  the  series 


NORMAL  CHILDREN   OF   FIVE  YEARS  97 

are  correctly  named.  Nevertheless  several  errors  remain  possible. 
The  child  may  take  the  street  lighter  for  a  small  boy,  through 
error  of  perspective;  several  cannot  name  the  advertisement. 
Suggestibility  is  still  great,  so  that  when  we  name  the  "patapoum" 
and  the  "nitchevo/'  they  are  shown  to  us;  on  the  other  hand 
when  we  ask  for  the  button,  no  other  object  is  pointed  out,  they 
satisfy  themselves  with  hunting,  without  designating  the  object. 

The  characteristic  of  a  child  of  five  years  is  that  it  executes 
the  four  following  experiments:  repeats  three  figures,  compares 
two  unequal  lines,  compares  two  weights,  defines  ordinary  ob- 
jects. These  are  the  four  characteristic  tests  of  a  child  of  five 
years  because  all  succeed.  From  the  first  attempt  they  repeat 
three  figures.  For  the  comparison  of  lines,  their  attention  must 
be  somewhat  stimulated  by  repeating  at  each  new  presentation, 
^' Which  is  the  longer?"  a  useless  precaution  for  children  of  seven. 
For  the  comparison  of  weights  there  is  a  little  awkwardness  at 
first.  Naively,  the  children  reply  to  the  question,  ''Which  is 
the  heavier?"  by  showing  a  box  without  weighing  it  in  the  hand. 
It  is  necessary  to  tell  them  that  they  must  weigh  the  boxes  by 
taking  one  in  each  hand;  certain  ones  weigh  only  one  of  them, 
and  others  take  both  in  the  same  hand.  We  therefore  say  that 
in  order  that  the  comparison  may  be  correct  this  lesson  must  be 
given;  but  this  done,  five  year  old  children  make  no  more  mistakes 
but  give  correct  replies.  The  fourth  test  which  they  success- 
fully pass  is  that  of  the  definition  of  objects.  They  reply  to  the 
questions,  mostly  in  terms  of  use;  a  fork,  it  is  to  eat  with;  a 
handkerchief,  it  is  to  blow  one's  nose;  occasionally  they  reply 
by  the  composition  of  things;  a  house,  it  is  of  stone,  a  horse, 
it  is  meat.  One  child  of  five  years,  evidently  precocious,  gave  us 
the  following  series,  worthy  of  a  child  of  nine  years:  "A  horse  is 
an  animal;  a  house  is  of  wood;  a  fork  is  of  iron;  a  handkerchief  is 
of  linen." 

This  then  is  the  equipment  of  a  child  of  five.  They  almost  all 
fail  when  given  higher  tests.  None  repeat  exactly  the  three  simple 
sentences  of  fifteen  words  each,  and  certain  ones  make,  doubtless 
through  inattention,  absurd  transformations,  as:  "In  sunamer 
snow  falls."  They  frequently  shorten  a  sentence  or  repeat  the 
beginning  of  it,  or  remain  silent.  W^hat  they  give  is  generally 
grammatically  correct.  Example:  One  says  "I  get  up  in  the 
morning,  I  go  to  bed  at  noon,"  another  says,  "Germaine  has 


y»  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

been  bad,  she  will  be  scolded.''  We  have  never  found  that 
sentences  are  given  devoid  of  all  grammatical  construction, 
neither  do  they  give  words  void  of  sense.  In  the  test  of  reasoned 
comparisons,  they  make  complete  failure.  These  children  cannot 
understand  in  what  way  different  things  are  unlike.  We  give 
below  a  bit  of  dialogue  which  we  exchanged : 

Q.  You  know  what  paper  is?    A.  Yes. 
Q.  You  know  what  cardboard  is?  A.  Yes. 
Q.  Are  they  alike?    A.  No,  they  are  not  alike. 
Q.  In  what  are  they  not  alike?    Silence. 
Q.  Why  isn't  paper  like  cardboard?    Silence. 

Q.  Then  how  do  you  know  that  a  thing  is  paper  or  that  it  is  cardboard? 
Silence.        •  ,  - 

Q.  Do  you  know  a  fly?    A.  Yes. 
Q.  And  a  butterfly.    Do  you  know  that?    A.  Yes. 
Q.  Are  they  alike?    A.  No,  they  are  not  alike. 
Q.  Well  then  in  what  way  are  they  not  alike?    A.  It  is  paper. 

The  final  answer  clearly  shows  that  the  child  does  not  under- 
stand what  is  asked  of  him.  Another  child  replies,  ''The  card- 
board is  not  like  paper  because  it  is  something  else."  For  the 
butterfly  he  gave  a  curious  reply,  ''Because  the  butterfly  has 
two  wings  and  no  head,  and  because  flies  have  heads  and  besides  a 
tail." 

This  verbiage  is  the  only  verbal  manifestation  in  any  sense 
spontaneous  that  we  have  been  able  to  collect  from  children  of 
five  years.  Putting  aside  the  tests  which  are  beyond  their 
capabilities,  we  have  the  following  conclusion : 

At  five  years,  a  normal  child  repeats  three  figures,  compares  two 
lines;  after  being  shown  how,  he  compares  two  weights;  he  can  also 
define  ordinary  objects. 

NORMAL   CHILDREN   OF   SEVEN   TO   ELEVEN   YEARS 

We  now  leave  the  Maternal  school,  and  enter  the  Primary 
grades.  We  examined  individually  45  children.  For  the  ages 
of  seven,  nine  and  eleven  years,  we  shall  not  note  here  all  the 
results,  of  which  several  have  been  obtained  by  groupings;  we 
shall  simply  show  what  we  obtained  from  10  children  at  each  age, 
chosen  not  for  the  quality  of  their  results,  but  in  consequence  of 
an  absolute  adjustment  of  the  tests. 


NORMAL   CHILDREN    OF   SEVEN   TO   ELEVEN   YEARS  99 

We  must  first  trace  the  boundary  line  which  separates  children 
of  five  years  from  those  of  seven.  It  is  furnished  by  the  series 
of  reasoned  comparisons.  Because  of  its  importance,  let  us  de- 
vote some  space  to  it. 

The  comparison  of  two  lines,  from  the  point  of  view  of  length, 
is  very  much  easier  than  the  comparison  of  two  objects  made  from 
memory.  In  the  first  place,  the  two  lines  are  there  under  their 
eyes,  while  the  others  must  be  called  to  mind;  besides  when  one 
compares  the  lines  one  knows  from  what  point  of  view  to  compare 
them;  while  in  the  other  test,  one  does  not  know  and  must  there- 
fore search  for  some  difference  to  note.  It  is  a  little  work  of 
invention,  which  presents  a  certain  difl&culty. 

We  shall  indicate  numerically  the  results  of  this  test,  in  the 
table  which  follows;  to  render  the  question  clearer  we  give  the 
results  obtained  with  children  of  nine  years. 

Here  is  the  manner  of  procedure  for  this  test.  We  first  ask 
concerning  each  object  to  be  compared,  if  the  child  has  seen  and 
knows  it.  All,  so  far  as  that  goes,  know  the  six  objects  (fiy, 
butterfly,  wood,  glass,  cardboard,  paper),  with  the  exception  of 
one  who  had  never  seen  a  butterfly.     Poor  child! 

The  first  step  taken,  the  question  is  put :  What  is  the  difference 
between  paper  and  cardboard?  This  question  is  not  always 
understood;  one  can  even  say  that  the  majority  of  children  do 
not  reply,  do  not  understand,  remain  silent,  or  make  absurd 
statements  through  a  desire  to  please;  for  example  by  repeating 
"the  cardboard."  This  is  what  we  call  the  ''first  time"  in  our 
table.  We  must  therefore  insist  by  changing  our  words  and  say: 
"Cardboard  and  paper  are  not  alike,  in  what  are  they  not  alike?" 
In  this  way  of  asking,  the  majority  of  children  of  seven  years, 
almost  all  (8  out  of  9),  could  give  at  least  one  correct  comparison. 
This  test  is  therefore  truly  a  boundary  which  they  pass,  and  is  an 
excellent  means  of  distinguishing  them,  in  regard  to  intellectual 
level,  from  the  children  of  five  years.  Still  they  do  not  all  al- 
ways make  the  three  comparisons,  and  out  of  9  children  examined, 
we  counted  7  silences  out  of  27  attempts,  therefore  about  one- 
fourth.  The  analysis  of  the  details  would  show  very  clearly 
the  infantile  character  of  the  repHes,  and,  for  instance,  the  great 
monotony  of  repetitions.  The  child  having  found  a  certain 
difference  in  the  first  comparison,  reproduces  it  for  the  others 
even  when  it  ceases  to  be  correct  by  the  transfer  thus,  having 


100  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

found  that  cardboard  is  thicker  than  paper,  and  that  the  butter- 
fly is  larger^  than  the  fly,  they  tell  us  that  wood  is  thicker  than 
glass.  Besides  these  there  are  absurd  comparisons,  as  for  in- 
stance, to  say  that  the  paper  is  whiter  than  the  cardboard  or 
smaller  than  cardboard,  or  that  glass  is  less  hard  than  wood,  or 
that  paper  is  white  and  cardboard  white  also. 

The  points  of  view  of  comparison  are  also  rudimentary:  it  is 
the  hardness,  size  (large  or  small,  this  is  very  frequent),  strength, 
soHdity,  fineness,  property  of  being  able  to  be  broken  or  cut,  and 
finally,  less  often,  the  color. 

Here  are  several  fragments  of  replies: 

The  most  awkward  of  all,  Larche does  not  reply  at  all. 

He  agrees  with  us  that  paper  and  cardboard  are  not  alike,  but 
he  can  indicate  no  difference.  He  remains  equally  helpless  with 
the  other  two  comparisons. 

Let  us  note  in  this  connection  an  important  point.  Children 
who  cannot  succeed  in  this  test  of  comparison  do  not  for  that 
reason  alone  prove  themselves  ignorant  of  the  difference  of  the 
two  objects.  Most  frequently  they  do  know  the  difference,  but 
they  cannot  find  or  formulate  it;  one  must  show  it  to  them. 
If  we  ask  them,  ''Which  is  larger,  the  butterfly  or  the  fly?"  these 
ignoramuses,  these  apparent  mutes,  reply  in  chorus,  ''the  butter- 
fly." But  this  is  no  longer  the  test,  it  is  something  much 
easier. 

A  degree  higher  than  Larche is  that  of  Bari .   When 

asked  the  difference  between  paper  and  cardboard  he  replies, 
"The  cardboard."  It  is  then  explained  to  him  that  they  are 
not  alike,  and  he  replies,  "Because  one  is  paper,  and  the  other  is 
cardboard."  For  the  second  comparison,  he  says,  "The  fly 
is  not  like  the  butterfly."  Q.  In  what?  A.  Because  the  fly  is 
not  made  like  the  butterfly.  Here  is  a  child  who  appreciates 
the  difference  but  cannot  formulate  it.  He,  however,  finds  the 
formula  for  the  last  comparison,  "Because  glass  breaks  but  wood 
if  it  falls  does  not  break."  He  crosses  the  boundary,  but  with 
difficulty. 

Pist succeeds  with  the  comparison.  He  does  not  under- 
stand in  the  beginning  and  it  must  be  explained  to  him  the  fact 

3  Thick  and  large  are  the  same  word  in  French — gros. 


NOKMAL   CHILDREN   OF   SEVEN   TO   ELEVEN   YEARS  lOl 

that  they  are  not  aHke.  His  first  reply  is  "the  paper."  Then 
when  it  is  explained  to  him,  he  says,  "Because  it  is  white.  Q. 
Which  is  white?  A.  The  paper.  Q.  And  the  cardboard?  A, 
There  is  cardboard  which  is  white."     It  is  evident  that  this 

cannot  be  counted  as  a  correct  reply.     Pist succeeds  better 

with  the  other  comparisons,  "The  fly  is  smaller  and  the  butterfly 
is  larger" — "Because  the  glass  breaks  and  wood  does  not  break. " 
Let  us  cite  the  reply  by  Vagni he  does  not  reply  to  the  ques- 
tions of  difference  and  when  it  is  explained  to  him  he  says:  "The 
cardboard  is  harder  than  the  paper."  He  finds  nothing  for  the 
comparison  of  the  fly  and  the  butterfly.  For  the  third  compari- 
son he  says:  "The  wood  is  harder  and  the  glass  is  not  hard." 
We  do  not  know  the  basis  of  his  thought  but  his  sentence  is  un- 
fortunate. 

We  have  dwelt  upon  the  less  clever  answers  because  they  are 
the  most  interesting.     Here  is  one  of  the  best  rephes;  it  is  that 

of   Giraud "Because   paper   is   finer   and   much   whiter." 

"Because  the  butterfly  is  much  larger  than  the  fly."  "Because 
with  a  piece  of  glass  you  can  cut  yourself,  and  with  a  piece  of  wood 
you  can't  cut  yourself." 

One  could  make  diffuse  accessory  remarks  which  are  not  with- 
out interest  for  pedagogy.  Thus  a  certain  child  says  that  a  fly 
has  two  wings  less  than  a  butterfly.  This  is  admirable  as  erudi- 
tion; nevertheless  this  learned  child  could  not  tell  the  difference 
between  wood  and  glass.  Her  memory  had  been  stored,  but  she 
had  not  been  given  the  spirit  of  observation. 

We  give  below  the  replies  arranged  in  a  series.  We  shall 
distinguish  between  responses  according  to  whether  the  subject 
repHes  to  the  question:  "What  difference  is  there?"  or  to  the 
supplementary  question:  "Why  are  they  not  alike?"  We 
note  the  number  of  successful  comparisons,  the  number  of  rep- 
etitions of  the  same  type  of  reply,  and  lastly,  the  number  of 
absurdities.  It  will  be  seen  that  at  7  years  a  single  child  Larche 
did  not  pass  the  test. 

By  this  method  it  can  be  seen  how  easy  it  will  be  to  classify 
any  child  whatever. 


102 


CETELOPMENT    OF   INTELLIGENCE 


Experiment  of  Reasoned  Comparisons 
Boys  of  Nine  Years 


Altmaye. 
Lamarq. 
Valent. . 
Guillerm 

Baz 

Bonj  — 
Dumo... 
Brie 

Larche. . 

Barr 

Pist 

Vagn 

Dast 

Leho 

Vala 

Girau — 

Ab 

Dugues.. 


A4     J     P 

H  fc  a 


Bo 

M    DO 


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H  O  g 

«  w  2 


h  CO 


+ 


Boys  of  Seven  Years 


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4- 

+ 

Although  the  test  of  reasoned  comparisons  is  truly  the  boundary 
of  seven  years,  we  have  tried  it  with  eight  subjects  nine  years 
old.  Even  with  them,  half  do  not  yet  understand  what  is  meant 
by  searching  for  a  difference,  and  their  grasp  of  the  situation 
must  be  emphasized  by  asking,  ''In  what  are  the  two  objects 
not  alike?"  Out  of  24  comparisons  (8  subjects  made  3  each) 
there  were  only  two  who  failed,  and  the  number  of  repetitions  of 
the  same  type  of  reply  is  not  more  than  3,  while  with  children 
of  seven  years  there  were  8  repetitions,  which  shows  a  noticeable 
improvement.  From  all  this  it  results  that:  At  seven  years 
children  make  the  proposed  comparison  sometimes  in  response  to 
the  first  question,  oftener  to  the  supplementary  question.  Mostly 
they  succeed  twice  out  of  three  times,  and  often  they  repeat  the 
same  type  of  reply.     The  progress  between  seven  and  nine  years 


NORMAL   CHILDREN   OF   SEVEN   TO   ELEVEN    YEARS  103 

exists  but  seems  too  subtle  to  serve  as  a  line  of  demarcation;  it 
might  be  made  more  apparent  by  an  increase  of  the  difficulty. 
But  our  aim  is  not  to  employ  this  test  for  that  distinction.  It 
simply  constitutes  a  boundary  between  five  and  seven  years; 
an  important  boundary,  because  it  is,  as  we  shall  see  later,  the 
boundary  of  imbecility  and  moronity,  for  those  subjects  who  are 
twelve  years  of  age. 

Before  leaving  this  question  of  reasoned  comparisons,  we  shall 
note  a  curious  fact.  To  some  fifteen  children  of  seven,  nine  and 
eleven  years,  we  have  proposed  comparisons,  having  for  their 
purpose  the  perception  not  of  the  differences  of  many  objects, 
but  of  their  resemblances,  for  instance,  the  resemblance  of  blood 
and  the  poppy,  a  fly  and  an  ant,  a  flea  and  a  butterfly,  and  lastly 
between  a  newspaper,  a  label  and  a  picture.  We  have  been 
amazed  at  the  difficulty  which  the  child  finds  in  seeing  a  similarity 
in  two  objects  which  they  know  to  be  different.  ''In  what  are 
they  alike!"  we  ask,  and  the  almost  constant  reply  is,  "They  are 
not  alike?"  The  child  is  dominated  by  a  spirit  of  differentiation. 
Perhaps  the  needs  of  practical  life  turn  their  attention  more 
towards  the  perception  of  differences  than  of  resemblances,  which 
only  become  apparent  in  scientific  studies.  It  would  be  worth 
while  to  investigate  in  this  direction.* 

After  having  thus  marked  the  limits  between  five  and  seven 
years,  that  is  to  say  between  the  Maternal  and  Primary  schools, 
we  shall  show  the  tests  which  mark  the  limits  between  the  ages 
above  seven  years,  and  which  will  consequently  permit  us  to 
distinguish  between  the  different  children  of  the  Primary  schools. 
The  tests  upon  which  we  shall  depend  seem  to  fall  into  three 
distinct  categories. 

1.  Tests  of  memory. 

2.  Tests  of  intelligence  which  are  partly  made  by  the  help  of 
language. 

3.  Tests  of  sensorial  intelligence. 

Although  there  is  no  clear  demarcation  between  the  three 
categories  of  tests  and  though  all  require  the  intervention  of  the 
senses,  of  memory  and  of  language,  it  is  by  the  proportion  and  the 
importance  of  these  elements  that  we  characterize  them. 

*  Since  these  lines  have  been  written  we  have  methodically  made  use  of 
the  comparison  of  similar  objects  as  a  test  of  mental  debility. 


104  DEVELOPMENT  OF  INTELLIGENCE 

MEMORY 

We  shall  study  three  forms  of  memory:  verbal  memory  of 
sentences,  memory  of  pictures,  memory  of  figures. 

Verbal  memory  of  sentences.  Between  twelve  and  seven  years 
there  is  not  only  a  difference  of  four  years,  but  there  is  an  acquisi- 
tion of  scholastic  culture  which  may  be  considered  enormous. 
Still,  in  spite  of  this  increase  of  instruction,  in  spite  of  the  develop- 
ment of  the  faculty  of  acquiring  knowledge  which  this  presupposes, 
children  of  nine  years  and  even  those  of  eleven  years  have  not  a 
power  of  memory  very  much  greater  than  their  younger  com- 
panions of  seven.  We  had  15  children  of  seven  years  repeat 
individually  the^  sentences  which  we  indicated  in  a  preceding 
chapter,  and  which  we  reproduce  here  to  save  the  trouble  of  look- 
ing back. 

First  sentence.  I  get  up  in  the  morning,  I  dine  at  noon,  and  I  go  to  bed 
at  night. 

Second  sentence.  In  summer  the  weather  is  beautiful.  In  winter  it 
snows. 

Third  sentence.  Germaine  was  naughty,  she  would  not  work;  she  will 
be  scolded. 

Fourth  sentence.  The  chestnut  tree  in  the  garden,  throws  upon  the 
ground  the  shadow  still  faint,  of  its  new  leaves. 

Fifth  sentence.  One  must  not  say  all  that  one  thinks,  but  one  must  think 
all  that  one  says. 

Sixth  sentence.  It  is  one  o'clock  in  the  afternoon,  the  house  is  silent, 
the  cat  sleeps  in  the  shade. 

Seventh  sentence.  One  must  not  confound  the  critical  spirit  with  the 
spirit  of  contradiction. 

Eighth  sentence.  The  horse  draws  the  carriage,  the  road  ascends,  and 
the  carriage  is  heavy. 

Each  sentence  is  slowly  and  energetically  pronounced  with  the 
required  intonation,  in  the  silence  of  the  examination  room. 
Nothing  distracts  the  child;  and  when  he  repeats  we  note  all  the 
words  he  pronounces,  his  time  of  hesitation,  his  self  corrections, 
his  remarks,  and  the  play  of  his  countenance  which  sometimes 
shows  that  he  is  not  satisfied  with  his  effort;  this  last  is  what  we 
call  the  mimique  de  jugement.  Besides  when  we  ask  him  if  he 
is  satisfied  with  his  repetition,  he  should  say,  "Yes,"  if  the  repeti- 
tion seems  to  him  correct,  ''No,"  if  it  seems  to  him  incorrect.^ 

^  We  now  keep  a  systematic  count  of  the  grading  which  the  child  makes 
by  his  answer.    This  aids  us  to  classify  him. 


NORMAL   CHILDREN    OF   SEVEN    TO   ELEVEN   YEARS 


105 


If  he  repeats  nothing,  or  if  he  only  repeats  the  first  words  of  the 

sentence,  we  say  "Well  now? "  but  without  urging.     We 

avoid  too  great  a  suggestion  which  would  force  the  memory  of  the 
child  and  lead  him  to  reply  by  an  absurdity.  This  example 
shows,  let  it  be  said  in  passing,  how  delicate  a  psychological 
experiment  is.  We  should  never  finish  if  we  enumerated  all  the 
precautions  that  should  be  taken. 

Averages  Obtained  in  an  Experiment  of  Verbal  Memory  of  Immediate  Repeti- 
tion with  Ten  Children  Each,  of  Seven,  Nine  and  Eleven  Years 


NUMBER   OF   INCOMPLETE    REPETITIONS 

SENTENCES  TO   REPEAT 

EXACJ 
REPETITIONS 

More  than 
half 

Less  than 
half 

Absurdities 

and 
obscurities 

7 
yrs. 

9 

yrs. 

11 

yrs. 

7 
yrs. 

9 

yrs. 

11 

yrs. 

7 
yrs. 

9 
yrs. 

11 

yrs. 

7 
yrs. 

9 
yrs. 

1 

1 

4 
5 

11 

yrs. 

"I  get  up 

8 
8 
8 
3 
0 
0 

4 
0 

9 
10 
10 
7 
1 
0 
3 
5 

9 
10 
8 
5 
3 
0 
9 
6 

2 
2 
2 
6 

4 
0 
5 
2 

2 
0 
0 
2 

5 
0 
4 
3 

3 
1 
2 
5 
4 
5 
1 
4 

0 
0 
0 
0 
6 
10 
1 
8 

0 
1 
0 
0 
4 
10 
2 
4 

0 
0 
0 
0 
3 
5 
0 
0 

2 
2 

2 
5 
2 
3 

8 

1 

"In  summer 

''Germaine 

"The  horse 

"It  is  one 

"The  chestnut  tree 

1 

"One  must  not  say 

1 

"One  must  not'  confound 

2 

Total 

31 

46 

50 

23 

16 

25 

25 

21 

8 

24 

11 

5 

In  the  above  table,  we  write  the  results  in  figures  which  we 
analyze  in  the  following  manner:  first,  in  the  columns  1,  2,  3,  we 
note  how  many  children  at  the  different  ages  made  an  exact 
repetition.  It  is  a  gross  result,  but  one  of  the  most  important; 
the  six  following  columns  contain  details  upon  the  quantity  of 
incorrect  repetitions;  they  are  noted  under  three  heads  according 
as  the  child  had  repeated  less  than  half  or  the  half  and  more,  of 
the  original  sentence.  Finally  the  last  three  columns  show  in 
detail  the  quality  of  the  incorrect  replies.  These  may  contain 
either  another  sense,  though  reasonable,  or  an  absurd  sense,  or 
finally  verbal  obscurities,  that  is  to  say,  sounds  that  are  not 
known  words. 

It  seems  to  us  interesting  to  make  this  distinction,  because 
the  first  nine  columns,  on  the  one  hand,  and  the  last  three  on  the 
other,  express  results  which  correspond  to  different  faculties; 


106  DEVELOPMElsrT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

not  to  repeat  the  whole  is  a  lack  of  memory;  to  make  absurd 
changes  is  an  error  of  judgment. 

Out  of  8  sentences  which  were  given  them,  the  children  of  seven 
years  made  a  total  of  31  correct  repUes,  that  is  about  three  for 
each  child.  In  examining  the  number  of  errors  according  to  the 
nature  of  the  sentences,  one  sees  that  these  errors  are  readily 
explained.  They  are  least  for  the  first  three  sentences,  whose 
sense  and  vocabulary  are  within  reach  of  the  children  of  seven  years ; 

in  the  two  sentences "One  must  not  say" "The  horse 

draws" the  sense  still  is  clear,  so  that  nearly  half  of  the  chil- 
dren succeed.     On  the  contrary,  the  3  other  sentences,   "The 

chestnut  tree ",  "It  is  one  o'clock "  and,  "One  must 

not  confound "  offer  by  their  style  and  subtle  meaning  a 

difficulty  which  these  young  intelligences  have  not  been  able  to 
master;  to  the  task  of  memory  is  added  the  task  of  comprehension. 

We  evaluate  in  the  same  way  the  results  for  the  nine  year  old 
children.  Obviously,  it  is  a  little  better;  their  exact  reproductions 
are  46  instead  of  31,  but  the  progress  has  been  in  the  more  difficult 
sentences,  as  "The  horse"  and  "One  must  not  confound."  If 
one  notes  that  these  children  of  nine  years  certainly  add  to  the 
advantage  of  better  comprehension  that  of  greater  control  over 
their  voluntary  attention,  one  recognizes  that  the  slight  superiority 
of  the  results  which  they  here  furnish  can  scarcely  be  imputed  to 
the  growth  of  memory. 

For  children  of  eleven  years,  there  is  again  a  slight  improvement ; 
the  exact  reproduction  of  the  children  of  this  age  is  50;  but  there 
again  the  §tudy  of  detail  shows  that  the  gain  operates  almost 
exclusively  upon  the  more  difficult  sentences,  "One  must  not 
confound,  etc. "  The  three  simple  sentences,  given  first,  have  the 
same  number  of  errors  as  at  nine  years. 

We  do  not  wish  to  force  the  significance  of  these  results,  which 
do  not  astonish  us  especially,  because  we  had  foreseen  them 
elsewhere;^  nor  shall  we  go  so  far  as  to  say  that  verbal  memory 
does  not  increase  with  age,  from  seven  to  nine  years.  We  main- 
tain simply  that  this  growth  seems  slight  when  completely  iso- 
lated from  certain  factors  which  complicate  it,  such  as  control  of 
voluntary  attention,  power  of  comprehension,  the  force  of  habit, 
etc. 

•  Experimental  Study  of  the  Intelligence,  Paris,  1903,  p.  260. 


NORMAL   CHILDREN    OF   SEVEN   TO   ELEVEN   YEARS  107 

If  now  we  examine  the  data  in  the  last  three  columns  of  our 
table,  that  which  is  due  to  errors  of  judgment,  we  find  a  consider- 
able difference  between  children  of  the  three  different  ages  indi- 
cated. The  number  of  absurd  errors  (such  as,  "I  go  to  bed  at 
noon,"  '^In  summer  snow  falls,"  ''One  must  think  all  that  one 
thinks,"  etc.)  is  considerable  among  the  youngest  children;  there 
being  14.  The  number  of  times  they  mutilated  a  word  or  uttered 
unintelligible  sounds  was  10,  which  makes  a  total  of  24  errors  of 
judgment;  there  are  only  11  at  nine  years  and  only  5  at  eleven 
years.  One  can  thus  clearly  see  that  this  test  classifies  the  chil- 
dren as  to  age,  better  by  the  absurdities  of  their  replies  than  by 
what  they  forget,  properly  speaking,  which  proves  once  more 
that  if  the  memory  increases  little  from  seven  to  eleven  years,  the 
judgment  on  the  contrary  increases  greatly.  One  gets  an  im- 
pression of  this  fact  without  the  aid  of  any  calculation,  when  one 
has  examined  the  attitude  of  the  children  during  tests  of  memory. 
The  child  of  seven  years  seems  to  give  himself  little  trouble.  He 
is  less  attentive,  because  he  regards  the  experimenter  less  when  he 
pronounces  the  sentence;  he  makes  visibly  less  effort  to  repeat, 
renounces  more  easily  the  pursuit  of  a  fleeting  memory;  and  above 
all  when  he  makes  a  mistake  in  repeating  he  has  less  often  that 
semblance  of  judgment  which  signifies  *'  I  realize  that  I  am  wrong." 

For  the  individual  diagnosis  the  following  conclusions  should 
be  borne  in  mind :  v 

At  seven  years,  a  child  repeats  an  average  of  3  sentences  out  of 
8  given  him,  and  he  commits  an  average  of  3  errors  through 
absurdities  and  obscurities. 

At  nine  years,  a  child  repeats  an  average  of  4  sentences,  and 
commits  only  1  error  through  absurdities  or  obscurities. 

At  eleven  years,  a  child  repeats  an  average  of  5  sentences  and 
commits  but  a  half  error  through  absurdities  or  obscurities. 

To  utilize  these  solutions  in  an  individual  diagnosis  we  must 
use  a  seriation.     Here  is  the  one  that  these  results  give  us.  ' 


108 


DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 


Seriation  of  Results  Obtained  by  the  Immediate  Repetition  of  Sentences  of 
14  to  15  Words  Each 

Children  of  Seven  Years 


NAMES 

NUMBER 

OF  SENTENCES 

FX  A  CTLY 

REPEATED 

NUMBER  OF  THE 

SENTENCE    EXACTLY 

REPEATED 

IN   WHICH  SENTENCE 
THE  ABSURDITY 
MANIFESTS  ITSELF 

Leho 

1 

2 
2 
3 
3 
3 
3 
4 
5 
5 

2 

1,3 
2,5 
1,  2,  3, 
1,2,3 
1,2,3 
1,3,8 
1,  2,  3,  5 
1,  2,  3,  5,  8 
1,  2,  3,  5,  8 

1,  5,  7 

Vala 

2,  4,  5,  6,  7,  8 
1,  7,  8 

Dugiies    

Dast 

5,  6 

Ab 

7 

Larch 

7 

Pist 

2,  4,  6 

Barr       .    .    . 

7 

Girau 

6,  7 

Vagni 

6,  7 

Children  of  Nine  Years 


Bonj 

Dum 

Altma 

Valent . . . 
Guillerm, 

Brie 

Berque.. 
Lamar. . . 

Bazi 

Gros 


2,3 

1,5,7 

1,  2,  3,  8 

5,  7 

1,  2,  3,  8 

7 

1,  2,  3,  8 

5,7 

1,  2,  3,  8 

7 

1,  2,  3,  6, 

7 

5 

1,  2,  3,  5, 

7 

1,  2,  3,  7, 

8 

6 

1,  2,  3,  5, 

7, 

8 

1,  2,  3,  5, 

6, 

7,8 

Children  of  Eleven  Years 


Corn. . 
Lecle . . 
Taudi. 
Bertra. 
Calif.., 

Lev 

Gorgi . . 
Leno... 
Barr. . . 
Vign. . . 


1,2,3 

5,7 

1,  2,  5 

4,7 

2,  3,  5,  7 

1 

1,  2,  3,  5 

1,  2,  3,  5,  8 

1,  2,  5,  6,  7 

1,  2,  3,  5,  7, 

8 

1,  2,  3,  5,  7, 

8 

1,  2,  3,  5,  6, 

7, 

8 

1,  2,  3,  5,  6, 

7, 

8 

NORMAL   CHILDBEN   OF   SEVEN    TO   ELEVEN   YEARS 


109 


Memory  for  pictures.  This  is  a  test  which  we  describe  while 
giving  the  technique.  Let  us  see  in  a  very  brief  way  the  number  of 
pictures  which  a  child  of  seven  can  retain,  compared  to  a  child 
of  nine  or  eleven  years. 

Apparently  the  memory  for  pictures  grows  rapidly  with  years. 
We  admit  that  it  grows,  but  it  must  be  less  rapid  than  the  pre- 
ceding numbers  would  lead  us  to  believe;  because  the  child  has 
need  of  a  certain  power  to  direct  his  attention,  to  distribute  it 
equally  among  the  pictures,  and  it  is  this  which  naturally  gives 
a  great  superiority  to  the  older  ones,  who  know  better  how  to 
look  than  the  younger  ones. 

Seriation  of  the  results  obtained  by  the  Memory  for  IS  Pictures 


CHILDREN   OP   7   TEARS 

CHILDREN   OF   9   YEARS 

CHILDREN   OP   11    YEARS 

Number  of 
pictures 

Number  of 
pictures 

Number  of 
pictures 

Leho — 
Vala.... 
Dugues . 
Larch. . . 
Dast. . . . 
Barri .  . . 
Vagn.... 

Abt 

Pist 

Gira .... 

3^ 

3 

3 

3 

4 

4 

5 

6 

6 

6. 

Aver- 

age, 

4.3 

Bergue .  . 
Altma. . . 
Bonfi. . . . 
Lamar. . . 
Dumo . . . 
Valen.  .. 
Guillerm 

Brie 

Gros 

Bazi 

2 
4 
5 
5 
6 
6 
8 
8 
8 
10 

Average,... 
^6.2 

Lecle 

Lev 

Taudi . . . 

Barri. . . . 

Bertra... 

Debr.. 

Gorgi.... 

Calif.... 

Vign 

Ga 

4 
5 
6 
6 

7 
7 
8 
9 
10 
10 

Average, 

'7.2 

We  remark  in  relation  to  this  last  seriation  that  which  would  be 
applicable  to  every  series  which  we  publish;  it  is  that  the  very 
great  difference,  which  is  noticeable  between  the  first  and  last 
terms  of  each  series,  comes  from  the  fact  that  the  series  is  the 
result  of  a  first  test.  If  one  repeated  it  two  or  three  times,  it 
would  disclose  the  following  fact  which  we  have  often  observed 
in  psychology;  each  pupil  would  present  a  slight  gain  as  a  result 
of  practice  from  the  re-examination,  with  an  equal  improvement 
for  all,  but  proportionately  larger  for  those  whose  results  were 
poorest  in  the  first  trial;  it  would  result  from  this  that  the  seriation 
at  each  repetition  would  condense  itself;  there  would  be  less  indi- 
vidual difference,  and  the  change  would  be  especially  marked 
among  the  weakest  terms.     It  is  therefore  the  lowest  which  gain 


110  DEVELOPMEN'T   OF   INTELLIGEN'CE 

most  by  the  repetition;  this  seems  paradoxical,  because  one 
thinks  of  the  ability  to  adapt  oneself  as  a  sign  of  intelligence;  and 
here  it  would  rather  be  a  sign  of  mediocrity.  But  it  is  easy  to 
understand  the  reason;  the  intelligent  adapt  themselves  quickly 
from  the  start,  and  they  are  thus  almost  immediately  at  their 
limit  of  adapt ibility;  on  the  contrary  the  mediocre  children  adapt 
themselves  less  quickly,  and  consequently  their  progress  is  more 
visible. 

Memory  for  figures.  This  is  an  exercise  which  tests  a  partic- 
ular sort  of  memory,  the  immediate  auditive  memory  for  figures, 
and  at  the  same  time  the  force  of  voluntary  attention. 

Every  subject  was  asked  to  repeat  a  series  of  figures  of  increas- 
ing lengths,  commencing  with  three  figures.  Three  attempts 
were  made  for  the  series  of  3  figures,  then  three  for  the  series  of 
4  figures  and  so  on,  until  one  arrived  at  a  series,  for  which  after 
three  attempts,  he  obtained  no  correct  reproduction.  The  figures 
were  written  beforehand,  and  read  by  the  experimenter  without 
the  subject  seeing  them.  We  make  the  seriation  by  making  use 
of  the  highest  series  which  had  been  well  retained.  In  spite  of  the 
brevity  of  this  indication,  it  merits  complete  confidence,  having 
been  obtained  as  the  result  of  many  attempts.  Experience  has 
shown  that  in  connection  with  the  maximum  series,  one  must 
note  the  number  of  times  that  the  subject  invents  figures  which 
have  not  been  pronounced,  as  well  as  the  giving  of  figures  in  their 
natural  order  (as  1,  2,  3,  4,  etc.),  and  finally  by  the  false  appreci- 
ation of  the  subject  as  indicated  by  his  manner  of  replying. 
Certain  ones  believe  that  they  have  replied  correctly,  when  they 
have  really  committed  errors;  if  one  overlooks  a  slight  inversion, 
let  it  pass,  but  if  one  slips  2  or  3  new  figures  into  a  series  without 
perceiving  it,  that  is  a  much  graver  fault.  It  is  therefore  impor- 
tant to  ask  each  time  for  the  judgment  of  the  subject  upon  his 
repetition.  A  slight  difficulty  arises  in  asking  him  for  a  judgment 
of  himself;  the  least  imprudent  word  forms  a  suggestion.  If  one 
asks:  "Have  you  repeated  that  correctly?"  the  subjects  often 
reply  ''yes'^  or  ''no"  according  to  the  very  slight  intonation  or 
scepticism  which  one  puts  into  the  voice.  The  best  procedure 
is  to  make  in  advance  this  arrangement ;  as  soon  as  a  series  has 
been  repeated,  the  subject  shall  say,  according  to  the  case:  ''It 
is  correct"  or  "It  is  not  correct" — or  more  simply  "That's  right" 
or  "That's  not  right."     We  regret  not  to  have  thought  in  time 


NOKMAL   CHILDREN   OF   SEVEN    TO   ELEVEN   YEARS 


111 


to  have  made  this  arrangement  w^ith  all  our  pupils;  it  is  an  omis- 
sion to  be  corrected  another  time. 


Seriation  obtained  from  the  memory  for  figures^ 

CHILDREN   OF   7   YEARS 

CHILDREN   OF   9   TEARS 

CHILDREN   OF    11    YEARS 

Names 

Maximum  series 

Names 

Maximum  series 

Names 

Maximum  series 

Pist 

Leho — 
Dugues . 
Girau. . . 
Larch... 
Vagni . . . 

Alt 

Barri.... 
Vala.... 
Dast.... 

3^ 

4 

5 

5 

5 

6 

6 

6 

6 

7 

Average, 
5.3 

Dumo . . . 
Bonfi. . . . 
Altma. . . 
Guillerm 
Valen  . .  . 
Berque . . 

Bazi 

Lamar. . . 
Gross — 
Brie 

4' 

5 
5 
6 
6 
6 
7 
7 
7 
7 

Average, 
6.0 

Bertra... 
Calif.... 

Lecle 

Levy 

Vign  .... 

Gorgi 

Gano.... 
Taudi . . . 
Debre.... 

5 
5 
6 
6 
6 
6 
6 
7 
7. 

•  Average, 
6.0 

These  three  series  seem  to  us  good  because  the  weakest  subjects 
have  not  had  very  different  results  from  those  of  the  average. 

There  is  scarcely  an  exception,  save  only  Pist seven  years, 

and  Dumo in  the  nine  year  group. 

This  group  of  tests  upon  memory  was  rapidly  made;  it  took 
scarcely  more  than  4  or  5  minutes.  In  general  we  interrupted 
it  by  other  tests  of  a  slightly  different  character,  in  order  to 
rest  the  child.  Our  tests  of  memory,  notwithstanding  their 
number,  must  not  be  considered  as  covering  all  the  forms  of 
memory;  they  concern  more  particularly  the  memory  for  im- 
mediate •  repetition  which  is  essentially  a  sensorial  memory. 
The  memory  for  ideas  is  ignored  almost  entirely.  This  is  an 
omission  which  we  note  is  passing,  and  which  it  would  be  easy 
to  fill. 

One  of  us  indicated  long  ago^  the  best  means  of  stud5dng  the 
memory  for  ideas;  it  does  not  consist  in  the  repetition  of  sentences 
difficult  of  comprehension,  because  those  who  have  a  good  memory 
can  repeat  quickly  and  exactly  that  which  they  have  not  even 
understood;  it  consists  in  causing  a  delay  between  the  hearing 
and  the  repetition,  and  obliging  the  subject  to  think  of  other 
things  during  that  interval;  then  all  that  is  sensorial,  the  echo 


'  Binet  and  Henri,  Treatise  upon  Sensation  and  Memory  of  Ideas,  Ann^e 
Psychologique,  I,  1894,  p.  1. 


112  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

of  auditive  memory,  disappears  and  scarcely  anything  but  the 
idea  remains.  We  therefore  propose  to  make  again  the  immediate 
repetition  of  the  8  sentences,  by  a  general  repetition.  It  is 
probable  that  the  work  which  we  announce  will  be  completed  by 
the  time  ^he  present  article  is  printed. 

TESTS   OF   SENSORIAL   INTELLIGENCE 

These  are  made  independently  of  the  development  of  language, 
of  the  abstract  idea,  and  have  an  extra-scholastic  character. 
They  are  important  from  many  points  of  view.  The  manifes- 
tations of  sensorial  intelligence  are  frequent  among  defectives, 
who  cannot  adapt  themselves  to  the  teaching  in  the  schools, 
and  these  facts  are  interesting  for  the  pedagogy  of  subnormals; 
they  prove  that  one  would  succeed  better  in  their  education  if, 
instead  of  obstinately  imposing  upon  them  scholastic  knowl- 
edge, which  is  not  made  for  them,  one  taught  them  other  things. 

We  divide  our  tests  of  sensorial  intelligence  into  2  groups. 

1.  Those  which  appeal  almost  wholly  to  the  elementary  proc- 
esses of  sensation,  perception,  and  sensorial  attention.  These 
are  the  comparison  of  lines. 

2.  Those  which  require  a  particular  intervention  of  judgment 
and  reflection;  these  are  putting  weights  in  order,  and  paper  cut- 
ting. 

Comparison  of  Lines.  It  will  be  recalled  that  the  booklet  of 
short  lines  to  be  compared,  contains  lines  one  of  which  measures 
constantly  30  mm.  and  the  other  varies  between  31  and  35  mm. 
There  are  15  comparisons.  Children,  even  when  very  young, 
have  shown  the  accuracy  of  their  glance.  The  number  of  tests 
was  15,  chance  might  have  produced  rather  more  than  7  errors. 
No  subject  gave  replies  due  to  chance,  that  is  to  inattention  pure 
and  simple,  because  the  incorrect  replies  are,  without  a  single 
exception,  comprised  between  the  numbers  9  and  15;  that  is  to 
say,  it  is  for  the  lines  where  the  difficulty  of  perception  of  differ- 
ence is  the  greatest,  that  the  mistakes  are  made.  Where  the 
pupils  failed  therefore  was  before  the  difficulty  of  comparison. 

They  are  generally  very  rapid  in  their  designations;  and  the 
test  lasts  scarcely  a  minute  for  the  designation  of  the  ,15'  lines. 
We  did  not  find  among  them  that  automatic  tendency  {oes-dig- 
nate  constantly  the  same  side.     The  automatism   could  easily 


NORMAL   CHILDREN   OF   SEVEN   TO   ELEVEN   YEARS 


113 


be  seen  from  the  figures  which  we  give.  Thus  the  longest  line 
in  the  series  which  we  give  is  constantly  to  the  right  for  the 
numbers  1,  3,  4,  6,  9,  10,  11,  13,  15  and  to  the  left  for  the  other 
numbers,  2,  5,  7,  8, 12, 14.  Consequently  a  person,  who  by  autom- 
atism would  always  designate  the  right  side,  would  make  errors 
exclusively  of  the  second  series,  and  on  the  contrary,  a  person 
who  designated  always  the  left  side,  would  make  exclusively 
errors  of  the  first  series.     There  is  to  be  noted  in  the  case  of  Larch 

the  rudiment  of  automatism,  starting  with  the  11th  line, 

and  in  the  case  of  Barri starting  with  the  12th,  but  this  is  not 

very  significant. 


Test  of  the  Short  Lines.    Seriation  of  the  Number  of  Errors 

CHILDREN    OF   7  TEARS 

CHILDREN   OP 

9  TEARS 

CHILDREN   OP    11    YEARS 

Names 

6  © 

Number  of 

the  hne  where 

the  error  is 

made 

Names 

"o  2 

Number 
of  the  line 

where 
the  error 
is  made 

Names 

•si 

Number  of 

the  line  where 

the  error  is 

made 

Vala.... 

4 

10,  13,  14,  15 

Berqu . . 

2 

12,  14 

L6vy... 

2 

9,12 

Dast.... 

3 

9,  13,  15 

GuiU... 

2 

11,  15 

Taudi . . 

0 

Larch... 

3 

11,  13,  15 

Dumo . . 

15 

Barri . . . 

0 

Barri. . . 

2 

12,  14 

Lamar. . 

11 

Lecle. . . 

0 

Abt 

14 

Bazi... 

15 

Calif... 

0 

Leho . . . 

11 

Altma. . 

9 

Debr... 

0 

Girau... 

13 

Bonfi. . . 

14 

Ganon. . 

0 

Vagni... 

15 

Valent.. 

14 

Bertra. . 

0 

Dugues 

13 

Brie. . . . 

0 

0 

Vign.... 

0 

Pist .... 

0 

0 

Bazi.... 
Gros.... 

0 
0 

0 
0 

Gorgi... 

0 

The  booklet  of  the  long  lines  offers  sufficiently  great  difficulties 
which  are  apparently  of  a  different  order;  the  lines  are  long  and 
it  is  not  easy  to  include  both  at  a  single  glance;  one  must  pass 
from  one  to  the  other,  consequently  the  attention  is  directed  from 
one  to  the  other  in  succession ;  perhaps  even  memory  must  inter- 
vene. It  is  an  operation  which  requires  a  little  art.  It  will  be 
useful  to  us  if  it  enables  us  to  select  the  children  according  to  age; 
but  in  interpreting  it,  one  must  remember  that  it  does  not  measure 
simply  the  sensorial  faculty  of  perception,  but  something  more 
refined.        ^ 

There  are  a  tiozen  pairs  of  lines  to  compare.  The  series  of 
comparison  is  rapidly  made;  it  takes  little  more  than  a  minute. 


114 


DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 


Comparison  of  Long  Lines.    Seriation  of  Number  of  Errors 
Children  of  Seven  Years 


NAMES 

NUMBER  OF 
ERRORS 

NUMBER   OF   LINE 

WHERE  ERROR 

OCCURRED 

Barri.                                                 

7' 
6 
6 
6 
5 
5 
4 
4 
4 
3, 

5.0 

3,  5,  7,  8,  9,  10,  11 

Vala 

3,  5,  6,  8,  9,  11 

Dugues 

2,  6,  7,  8,  10,  11 

Leho 

2,  6,  7,  8,  10,  11 

Dast 

1,  4,  5,  9,  12 

Larch 

3,  4,  7,  8,  11 

Pist 

6,  8,  9,  12 

Abt 

3,  6,  10,  11 

Vagn 

1,  5,  9,  12 

Girau ...                     

6,  7,  10 

Children  of  Nine  Years 

Valent 

6 
6 
6 
5 
5 
3 
3 
3 
2 
2 
1 

■4.2 

1,  2,  3,  5,  7,  10 

Dumo 

4,  6,  7,  8,  10,  11 

Altma. .    . 

2,  4,  6,  8,  10,  11 

Gross 

3,  6,  8,  10,  11 

Berqu 

2,  3,  6,  9,  12 

Bonfi 

7,  8,  12 

Guillerm 

5,  8,  12 

Lamar 

4,  7,  9 

Berqu 

3,  11 

Bazi 

5,  12 

Brie 

9 

Children  of  Eleven  Years 


Bertra. 
L6vy. . 
Vign. . . 
Barri. . 
Gorgi.. 
Taudi. 
Lecle. . 
Calif. . , 
Gano. . 
Debra. 


7 

3,  7,  8,9,  10,11,12 

6 

2,  4,  6,  7,  8,  10 

5 
4 

2,  6,  7,  8,  10 

3,  6,  8,  12 

3 
3 

>     3.5 

2,  6,  10 
6,  10,  11 

2 

7,  11 

2 

7,10 

2 

2,3 

ij 

3 

If  one  examines  what  underlies  these  figures,  it  will  be  found 
very  interesting.  These  children  of  eleven  years  have  a  remark- 
ably accurate  glance;  certain  ones  who  make  only  2  or  3  errors 


NORMAL   CHILDREN   OF   SEVEN   TO   ELEVEN   YEARS  115 

are  more  clever  than  some  intelligent  adults.  It  is  rare  to  jfind 
a  test  which  will  show  the  superiority  of  a  child  of  eleven  over  an 
adult. ^  This  comes  from  the  fact  that  the  glance  is  a  natural 
quality  which  cannot  be  cultivated  at  school;  probably  it  is  one 
of  those  aptitudes  which  makes  part  of  the  psychology  of  the 
savage,  and  it  would  be  interesting  to  know  how  much  it  is  worth 
with  the  defective. 

The  consideration  of  the  nature  of  the  errors  permits  us  to  elimi- 
nate the  element  of  chance.  To  judge  hastily,  one  might  say  that 
if  chance  gives  6  correct  replies  out  of  12,  every  child  whose  cor- 
rect replies  number  6  has  a  glance  no  more  accurate  than  blind 
chance.  But  in  reality,  the  systematic  distribution  of  the  errors 
in  the  second  part,  from  7  to  12,  shows  that  they  are  due  to  the 
difficulty  of  comparison.  The  errors  from  1  to  6  are  those  which 
should  be  ascribed  to  inattention,  especially  in  the  case  of  chil- 
dren, who  like  Debra and  Gano have  committed  no 

error  with  the  pairs  of  lines  from  7  to  12. 

A  word,  in  passing,  upon  automatism.  The  longest  line  is  to 
the  right,  for  the  numbers  1,  4,  5,  9,  12  and  to  the  left  for  the 
numbers  2,  3,  6,  7,  8,  10,  11.  This  points  out  Dast immedi- 
ately as  an  automaton  to  the  left,  and  also  Vagni;  the  automatisms 
to  the  right  are  more  numerous,  which  is  quite  natural  as  one 
employs  the  right  hand  for  making  the  designation;  it  is  to  be 

found  in  the  case  of  Vala ,  Bertra,  Leho ,  Abt , 

Dumo ,  Altma ,  Gross ,  Levy ,  Vign ,  etc. 

For  almost  all  there  is  a  slight  inclination  to  point  to  the  right; 
that  is  easily  understood;  when  there  is  a  doubt,  automatism 
triumphs.  By  actual  count  there  are  found  among  the  youngest 
children  33  errors  to  the  right  and  16  to  the  left,  that  is  to  say, 
less  than  half.  Those  of  nine  years  commit  27  errors  by  desig- 
nating to  the  right  and  14  errors  by  designating  to  the  left;  lastly, 
at  eleven  years  there  are  31  errors  of  the  first  class  and  4  of  the 
second;  it  seems  in  the  last  case  that  the  right-handedness  which 
develops  with  age,  influences  the  automatism  to  the  right.  There 
would  be  reason  then  to  think  that  if  the  automatism  is  a  sign 
of  the  lack  of  intelligence,  the  right-handed  form  of  automatism 
is  a  sign  of  the  development  of  voluntary  motor  power. 

8  We  give  some  examples  of  results  obtained  with  adults.  A  school 
director  commits  two  errors  with  the  long  lines;  a  lady,  two  errors,  also. 
An  adult  (Binet),  3  errors.  A  teacher,  5  errors.  Young  ladies  of  twenty, 
4,  5  and  6  errors. 


^l 


116 


DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGEKCE 


Seriation  of  the  Results  Furnished  by  the  Arrangement  of  Weights 
Children  of  Seven  Years 


Vagni. 


Valad. 


Dast. 


Larch. 


Dugue. 


Pist. 


Leho. 


Abt. 


Barri, 


Girau. 


TOTAL    NUMBER 
OF  ERRORS 


22 


20 


20 


14 


13 


10 


ORDER  GIVEN  TO  THE 
WEIGHTS 


15,  6,  3,  9,  12 
15,  9,  6,  3,  12 
15,  3,  6,  9,  12 

15,  3,  12,  9,  6 
12,  15,  6,  3,  9 
3,  15,  9,  6,  12 

15,  3,  6,  9,  12 
15,  6,  12,  9,  3 
15,  3,  6,  9,  12 

15,  12,  9,  3,  6 
15,  9,  3,  6,  12 
15,  6,  12,  3,  9 

15,  9,  12,  6,  3 
12,  15,  9,  3,  6 
.9,  12,  6,  15,  3 

15,  9,  12,  3,  6 
15,  6,  12,  9,  3 
15,  12,  9,  3,  6 


15,  9,  12,  6,  3 
15,  9,  12,  6,  3 
15,  12,  6,  9,  3 

2 
2 
2 

12,  15,  9,  6,  3 
12,  15,  9,  6,  3 
15,  9,  12,  6,  3 

2 
2 
2. 

15,  12,  9,  3,  6 
15,  12,  9,  6,  3 
15,  12,  9,  6,  3 

2^ 
0 

oj 

15,  12,  9,  6,  3 
15,  12,  9,  6,  3 
15,  12,  9,  6,  3 


ERRORS  BT 

TEST 


6^22 

6  [20 

4^20 
8j 

6[l4 
6j 

4h3 


h 


NORMAL   CHILDREN   OF   SEVEN   TO   ELEVEN   YEARS 


117 


Children  of  Nine  Years 


NAMES 

TOTAL    NUMBER 
OF  ERBOBS 

OBDBR   GIVEN  TO  THE 
WEIGHTS 

KRBOR8  BT 

TEST 

Altma 

12 

[15,  12,  6,  9,  3 
\  15,  3,  9,  6,  12 
[15,  9,  6,  12,  3 

2 
6^  12 

4. 

■ 
Lamar 

10 

[15,  12,  9,  6,  3 
]  15,  12,  3,  6,  9 
[15,  9,  6,  3,  12 

0 
4[  10 

6. 

Guillerm 

6. 

[15,  12,  9,  3,  6 
]  12,  15,  6,  9,  3 
[15,  12,  9,  6,  3 

'1 
4[    6 

0. 

Grapi 

4 

[12,  15,  9,  6,  3 
]  15,  9,  12,  6,  3 
[15,  12,  9,  6,  3 

2 
2 
0. 

•    4 

Berqui 

2 

[15,  12,  9,  6,  3 
]  15,  12,  9,  6,  3 
[15,  12,  6,  9,  3 

'1 
0>    2 

2} 

Dumo 

2 

[15,  12,  9,  6,  3 
]  15,  12,  6,  9,  3 
[15,  12,  9,  6,  3 

0 

2\    2 

0. 

Bazi 

2 

15,  12,  9,  3,  6 
15,  12,  9,  6,  3 
.15,  12,  9,  6,  3 

0^    2 

0. 

Brie 

2 

15,  12,  9,  6,  3 
15,  12,  9,  6,  3 
.12,  15,  9,  6,  3 

'1 
0^    2 

2J 

Valent 

0 

15,  12,  9,  6,  3 
15,  12,  9,  6,  3 
,15,  12,  9,  6,  3 

0 
Of"    0 

0, 

Bonfi 

0 

15,  12,  9,  6,  3 
15,  12,  9,  6,  3 
,15,  12,  9,  6,  3 

0 

o[  0 

oj 

Gros 

0 

15,  12,  9,  6,  3 
15,  12,  9,  6,  3 
.15,  12,  9,  6,  3 

0^ 
0^    n 

oJ 

118 


DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 


Children  of  Eleven  Years 


Debra. 


Lecler. 


Barri. 


L6vy. 


Vign. 


Gorgi . 


Gan. 


Tandi. 


Bertra. 


Calif. 


TOTAL    NUMBER 
OF  ERRORS 


10 


ORDER   GIVEN  TO  THE 
WEIGHTS 


9,  6,  12,  15,  3 
12,  15,  9,  6,  3 
15,  12,  9,  6,  3 

12,  15,  9,  6,  3 
15,  12,  9,  3,  6 
15,  12,  9,  6,  3 

[15,  12,  9,  3,  6 

15,  12,  9,  3,  6 

[15,  12,  9,  6,  3 

Cl5,  12,  9,  6,  3 

15,  12,  9,  6,  3 

[l2,  15,  9,  6,  3 

[15,  9,  12,  6,  3 

15,  12,  9,  6,  3 

[15,  12,  9,  6,  3 

[15,  12,  9,  6,  3 

15,  12,  9,  6,  3 

[12,  15,  9,  6,  3 

[15,  12,  9,  6,  3 

15,  12,  9,  6,  3 

,15,  12,  9,  6,  3 

15,  12,  9,  6,  3 
15,  12,  9,  6,  3 
.15,  12,  9,  6,  3 

15,  12,  9,  6,  3 
15,  12,  9,  6,  3 
15,  12,  9,  6,  3 

15,  12,  9,  6,  3 
15,  12,  9,  6,  3 
15,  12,  9,  6,  3 


ERRORS   BY 
TEST 


2  MO 

oj 

0[    2 
2j 

0[    2 
0 


0 

0 

2 

2j 

0] 

o[ 

0 

OJ 

0] 

o[ 

0 

oJ 

0] 

0 

0 

oJ 

0] 

0 

0 

NOKMAL   CHILDREN   OF   SEVEN   TO   ELEVEN   YEARS 


119 


Arrangement  of  5  weights.  This  test  may  be  analyzed  in  two 
ways,  in  watching  the  child  do  the  test,  and  in  noting  the  order 
in  which  he  places  the  weights.  These  are  two  phases  of  the 
experiment  which  have  about  the  same  results,  and  have  the 
advantage  of  the  one  confirming  the  other;  they  must  therefore 
be  separately  analyzed  to  see  if  they  conflict. 

An  observation  of  the  reaction  of  the  child  often  shows  whether 
he  arranges  the  weights  haphazard,  or  whether  he  compares 
them.  When  a  child  puts  aside  the  first  weight  which  comes  to 
his  hand  without  comparing  it  with  the  others,  one  is  immedi- 
ately warned;  one  should  note  also  those  who  use  only  one  hand, 
and  those  who  use  two,  weighing  the  different  weights  at  the  same 
time  with  both  hands. 

It  will  be  noticed  that  the  youngest  children  committed  very 
serious  mistakes,  so  serious  that  one  questions  if  they  have  under- 
stood very  much;  the  maximum  error  would  have  been  30  and  the 
mean  error  near  20.  There  are  3  that  are  no  better  than  mere 
chance.  The  children  rarely  corrected  themselves;  the  third 
attempt  is  no  better  as  an  average  than  the  second;  (36  errors 
for  all  in  the  first,  34  in  the  second  and  43  in  the  third),  experi- 
ence taught  them  nothing.  Children  of  nine  commit  infinitely 
fewer  mistakes;  all  make  an  arrangement  that  is  better  than  by 
chance,  but  they  do  not  correct  themselves  any  better  than  the 
seven  year  old  children  (8  mistakes  in  the  first,  18  in  the  second  and 
14  in  the  third).     Children  of  eleven  years — ^leaving  out  the  first, 

Debra ,  who  must  have  had  a  curious  lack  of  attention — 

made  fewer  mistakes  by  far  (6  for  the  first,  4  for  the  second  and 
4  for  the  third).  We  note  again  that  it  is  the  heaviest  weight 
which  is  the  most  frequently  put  in  its  place.  The  children  of 
seven  years  put  it  24  times  in  its  place;  children  of  nine  30  times, 
and  of  eleven  25  times.  It  can  be  seen  by  the  following  statistical 
study  how  the  different  children  distributed  their  attention.  Here 
are  the  details  of  the  exactness  of  position. 


Number  of  Times  Each  Weight  Was  Put 

in  Correct  Position 

WEIGHT 

15 

12 

9 

6 

3 

For  10  children  of  11  years 

25 
29 
24 

24 
24 
10 

28 
23 
12 

26 
24 
12 

27 

For  11  children  of    9  years 

26 

For  10  children  of    7  years 

15 

120  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

While  the  children  of  nine  and  eleven  years  busy  themselves 
with  all  the  weights,  those  of  seven  years  fix  their  attention 
principally  upon  the  heaviest.  The  rest  are  neglected.  They 
therefore  do  only  a  part  of  their  work,  that  which  especially 
appeals  to  them.  Is  it  because  in  the  explanation  which  is  given 
them  they  are  told  to  put  the  heaviest  aside  first?  It  is  possible 
if  they  were  told  to  put  the  lightest  aside  first,  that  they  would 
make  the  opposite  error.  It  would  be  worth  investigating.  In 
any  case  the  interesting  thing  is  that  their  attention  remains 
local,  partial,  it  does  not  synthesize  the  whole;  and  this  is  a  proof 
of  the  weakness  of  attention,  or  of  the  weakness  of  comprehension. 

Omission  of  weights.  This  test  is  made  immediately  following 
the  preceding.    Here  are  the  results: 

At  seven  years,  the  mistakes  on  the  average  are  so  many  as  to 
be  incalculable. 

At  nine  years,  there  is  an  average  of  2  errors  with  a  maximum 
of  5. 

At  eleven  years,  there  is  an  average  of  2  errors  with  a  maximum 
of  5. 

Paper  cutting.  This  is  a  very  difficult  exercise.  We  have  not 
had  time  to  try  it  at  length.  We  have  ascertained  only  that  at 
twelve  years,  few  normal  children  draw  a  central  diamond. 

These  tests  of  sensorial  intelligence  require  further  development, 
for  they  will  certainly  be  a  very  useful  aid  in  analysing  the  apti- 
tudes of  defectives.  It  will  be  advantageous  to  maintain  the 
distinction  which  we  have  proposed  between  the  faculties  of 
sensation  and  of  sensorial  perception  (comparison  of  lines),  and 
that  of  judgment  and  sensorial  reasoning  (the  arranging  of  weights 
and  paper  cutting). 

SUGGESTIBILITY 

We  do  not  beheve  that  the  study  of  the  manifestations  of  sug- 
gestibility will  permit  the  evaluation  of  the  intellectual  level. 
Without  doubt  we  may  lay  down  the  principle  that  suggestibility 
in  its  extreme  form  requires  a  suspension  of  critical  sense.  But 
daily  observation  shows  us  persons  of  very  keen  intelligence  who 
are  however  not  lacking  in  credulity.  On  the  other  hand,  when 
attempting  to  bring  out  the  suggestibility  of  a  school  child,  one 
does  not  have  to  take  into  account  simply  his  judgment;  different 
feelings  of  reserve,  discretion,  or  propriety  enter  into  the  experi- 


NORMAL   CHILDREN   OF   SEVEN   TO   ELEVEN   YEARS 


121 


ment  which  would  make  an  mtelligent  adult  simulate  suggesti- 
bility, in  order  not  to  offend  the  experimenter;  or  even  to  become 
really  suggestible  through  a  feeling  of  timidity,  which  has  a 
certain  social  value.  One  of  us  has  shown  that  defectives  are 
rendered  less  suggestible,  simply  through  an  absence  of  the  feeling 
of  timidity,  and  this  absence  is  in  them  a  lack  of  social  sense. 

These  reservations  once  made,  we  give  the  results  obtained 
from  the  Suggestion  Test.  We  designate  with  0  the  absence  of 
resistance;  H  indicates  hesitation  before  the  suggestion,  and  1-h, 
2-h,  3-h,  so  many  hesitations;  av.  indicates  that  the  suggestion 
has  been  avoided  and  1  av.,  2  av.,  3  av.,  that  a  corresponding 
number  of  the  suggestions  have  Jbeen  avoided.  (See  p.  57,  for 
the  explanation). 


CHILDttEN 

OF  7  TEABS 

CHILDBEN  OP  9  TEAKS 

CHILDREN  OF 

11  TEAB8 

Leho 

0 

Mont 0 

Bertra 

....  Ih 

Daste 

0 

Briet 0 

Vign^ 

....  Ih 

Barri 

0 

Valent 1  h 

Barri 

....  Ih 

Larch 

0 

Dumo 1  h 

Taud 

....  2h 

Abl 

Ih 

Gross 1  h 

Lecler 

....  3h 

Dugues.... 

Ih 

Lamar 2  h 

L6vy 

....  3h 

Girau 

2h 

Grap 2h 

Debr 

....  2  av 

Vala 

3h 

Altma 2  h 

Gorgi 

2  av 

Vagna 

3h.. 

Bazi 3  av 

Gano 

....  3  av 

Pist 

3  av 

Berquin 3  av 

INTELLIGENCE   WITH  DEVELOPMENT   OF  LANGUAGE 

The  study  of  the  aptitudes  is  most  important,  because  it  is  by 
their  lack,  as  we  shall  see  later,  that  mental  defect  betrays  itself 
the  most  strikingly;  it  is  the  difficulty  of  comprehending  an  ab- 
stract question,  or  of  replying  in  such  a  way  as  to  give  proof  of 
judgment,  of  spontaneity,  and  of  invention.  We  have  used  many 
experiments;  there  is  one  that  is  of  chief  importance,  that  of 
abstract  questions;  others,  of  secondary  importance,  are  those  of 
incomplete  sentences,  concrete  and  abstract  definitions,  rhymes, 
synthesis  of  three  words  in  a  sentence. 

Abstract  questions.  We  have  already  given  several  examples 
of  abstract  questions. 

We  shall  give  later  (p.  124)  a  complete  list  in  the  form  of  a  table 
with  the  results  obtained. 


122  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

Our  series  of  questions  presents  an  order  of  increasing  difficulty. 

When  the  child  is  brought  in  to  be  examined,  it  is  useless  to 
waste  time  in  preliminary  explanations;  the  first  question  is  so 
easy  that  it  is  sufficient  to  pronounce  it  in  a  tone  of  interrogation, 
for  the  child  even  the  one  of  seven  years  to  understand  what  is 
wished  of  him  and  to  reply.  The  bait  is  taken  and  the  sequence 
of  questions  elicits  naturally  the  replies.  These  are  written 
down  exactly  as  given  without  correction.  The  hesitancy  of  the 
child  is  noted,  his  embarrassment,  his  slowness  to  speak.  If  one 
encounters  mutism,  one  excites  the  emulation  of  the  child  persuad- 
ing him  that  he  can  reply,  repeating  the  question  with  proper  tone 
and  inflection.  One  should  avoid  such  insinuation  as,  *'You 
do  not  know?'^  or  "You  do  not  understand?"  Because  this 
encourages  indolence  and  carelessness,  and  there  are  very  few 
embarrassed  children  who  would  not  quickly  seize  such  a  subter- 
fuge. The  best  way  is  always  to  encourage  in  order  that  every 
one  may  do  his  best.  We  have  here  an  examination  approaching 
a  clinical  examination,  and  one  must  show  much  patience  and 
gentleness.  There  are  two  errors  to  be  avoided,  one  of  procedure 
at  the  moment  of  the  test;  the  other  of  interpretation,  when 
later  one  studies  the  replies.  The  error  of  procedure  consists  in 
going  too  rapidly  and  not  being  sufficiently  patient  in  awaiting 
the  reply.  ^Mutism  evidently  has  an  enigmatical  character;  it 
may  signify,'  "I  understand  nothing "  or  else  it  may  come  from 
the  fact  that  the  child  has  a/ slow  mind  and  does  not  at  once  find 
a  suitable  answer;  or'k.gain  the  child  has  considerable  reflection 
and  judgment,  and  cannot  content  himself  with  the  first  answer 
that  comes  into  his  mind,  but  is  searching  for  a  better;  it  is  evi- 
dent that  those  who  reply  haphazard  are  the  more  alert  but  not 
necessarily  the  more  intelligent.  One  of  us  has  elsewhere^  in- 
sisted upon  the  necessity  of  choosing  between  several  interpre- 
tations of  the  slowness  of  intellect. 

In  questioning  school  children,  one  arrives  at  a  true  interpre- 
tation by  taking  into  account  all  of  the  replies;  one  can  soon  de- 
termine whether  it  is  a  question  of  the  slowness  of  a  judicial  mind 
or  of  one  that  does  not  comprehend;  but  this  work  of  interpretation 
upon  the  sum  total  of  the  replies  cannot  conveniently  be  made 

^  ^tude  experimentale  de  V intelligence,  Paris,  Schleicher,  1902,  p.  45 
and  ff. 


IsTORMAL   CHILDEEN   OF   SEVEN   TO   ELEVEN   YEARS  123 

except  when  all  of  them  are  brought  together.  Durmg  the  exami' 
nation  one  does  not  yet  know.  One  must  therefore  be  prudent 
in  selecting  the  right  moment  when  it  is  safe  to  pass  to  another 
question.  The  matter  is  a  very  delicate  one.  It  is  far  better 
to  waste  a  little  time  than  to  throw  a  slow  subject  into  confusion. 
We  formally  call  the  attention  of  the  experimenter  to  this  source 
of  error.  With  a  little  experience  one  soon  sees  whether  or  not 
the  child  is  hunting  for  a  reply  or  if  he  has  given  up;  the  expression 
of  his  countenance  may  be  a  valuable  indication. 

It  remains  to  interpret  the  data.  We  should  have  wished  to 
eliminate  from  this  interpretation  all  that  is  arbitrary,  and  certainly 
we  are  not  entirely  satisfied  with  our  results.  Nevertheless  one 
principle  has  guided  us;  we  are  not  forced  to  search  for  absolute 
accuracy  in  the  replies;  we  take  the  sentences  of  the  children  of 
1 1  as  forming  the  standard  by  which  we  compare  those  of  younger 
children.  There  is  therefore  a  personal  part  in  our  selection; 
but  this  personal  part  consists  in  selecting  from  replies  which 
have  been  really  thought  out  and  given,  in  estimating  these 
replies,  and  not  in  making  out  of  whole  cloth  an  ideal  form  for 
the  correct  reply.  We  have,  moreover,  attempted  to  take  into 
consideration  the  mentality  of  children.  Certain  replies  might  be 
considered  appropriate  in  a  dilettante,  and  with  a  grain  of  irony 
they  might  even  seem  to  be  witty  retorts.  To  how  many  diffi- 
culties could  not  one  reply,  as  did  a  certain  child;  ''One  should 
go  to  bed,"  or  ''One  must  consult  the  doctor."  Frequently  we 
have  encountered  these  unexpected  ideas,  which  amused  us  great- 
ly. Certain  expressions,  by  the  way,  such  as,  "Ah!  Madame!" 
of  Shakespeare,  would  be  appropriate  for  every  possible  situation. 
We  have  nevertheless  concluded  that  what  would  be  wit  in  a 
skeptic  of  thirty,  would  be  incoherence  of  thought  in  a  child  of 
7.  Here  again,  if  one  is  in  doubt,  a  glance  at  the  sum  total 
of  the  replies  of  a  subject  enlightens  us.  Notwithstanding  this 
there  remain  replies  which  are  frankly  enigmatical,  as  for  example 
the  affirmation  "Nothing"  which  in  extreme  cases  might  have  a 
meaning  but  which  again  might  only  be  a  verbal  reflex.  We 
regret  having  sometimes  accepted  their  replies  without  explan- 
ation. One  is  always  learning.  When  the  reply  is  ambiguous, 
one  should  insist  and  almost  force  the  child  to  develop  differently 
his  idea.     This  is  not  always  easy;  it  should  at  least  be  tried. 

We  give  below  the  series  of  questions,  and 'the  replies  with  our 


124 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 


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NORMAL   CHILDREN   OF   SEVEN   TO   ELEVEN   YEARS  129 

markings,  which  are  quite  conventional  and  provisional.  They 
may  be  divided  into  3  groups:  1st,  the  replies  having  a  meaning 
bearing  upon  the  questions;  2nd,  absurd,  unintelligible,  ambiguous 
replies,  those  having  a  wrong  meaning;  3rd,  silence.  It  is  chiefly 
into  the  first  group  that  we  have  attempted  to  introduce  degrees. 
Those  which  we  propose,  after  having  discussed  these  things  at 
length  with  all  possible  care  (it  requires  judgment  to  appreciate 
tests  of  judgment,  and  we  hope  not  to  have  been  entirely  lacking) 
have  the  advantage  of  establishing  a  uniform  system  of  marking, 
applicable  to  all,  which,  if  in  certain  details  it  might  seem  arbitrary, 
cannot  however  be  accused  of  favoritism.  Furthermore,  not- 
withstanding the  interest  and  even  the  pleasure,  which  we  have 
found  in  making  these  distinctions,  they  are  not  of  very  great 
importance  in  making  a  diagnosis;  because  we  must  above  all 
take  into  account  the  silences  and  the  absurd,  ambiguous,  non- 
sensical replies. ^^ 

QUESTIONS 

First  question.  When  one  is  sleepy  what  must  one  dof  A  question 
so  simple  that  any  one  might  reply,  and  the  reply  is  nearly  always 
satisfactory.  In  the  answers  marked  2  it  is  simply  the  expression 
of  the  thought  that  is  defective. 

Second  question.  When  it  is  cold  what  must  one  do?  A  very  easy 
question.  One  can  scarcely  find  shades  of  difference  in  the  value 
of  the  answers.  Replies  marked  2  and  3  indicate  a  poorer  means 
of  protection  against  the  cold,  as  it  is  not  so  general  as  that  indi- 
cated by  replies  marked  1. 

Third  question.  When  one  is  in  danger  of  being  late  for  school 
what  must  one  dof  In  order  to  reply  one  must  comprehend  the 
precise  meaning  of  the  demand;  many  children  answered  badly 
because  they  did  not  imder stand.  It  is  easy  to  see  that  the  re- 
plies marked  2  contain  a  wrong  comprehension.  We  ask  what 
must  be  done  to  avoid  the  menace  of  actual  tardiness.  One  child 
understood  that  it  was  a  question  of  preventing  one's  tardiness 
next  day;  another  described  the  consequences  of  actually  being 
late,  for  example,  the  punishment  inflicted  upon  the  tardy  ones, 
or  the  necessity  for  ringing  the  bell,  since  the  door  of  the  school 
would  be  closed. 

^°  Editor's  Note:  We  have  translated  these  questions  and  replies  liter- 
ally. But  for  use  with  American  children  we  employ  a  more  colloquial 
form. 


130  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

F mirth  question.  When  one  sees  that  it  is  raining  when  one  is 
going  out,  what  must  one  do?  Very  easy  question,  as  easy  as  2. 
In  the  replies  marked  2  the  subject  indicates  an  inappropriate 
solution,  too  special  to  respond  to  the  general  character  of  the 
demand;  but  it  is  not  serious. 

Fifth  question.  When  one  is  tired  and  has  not  enough  money  to 
take  the  omnibus,  what  must  one  do?  This  little  problem  brings 
out  the  differences  of  comprehension  and  of  judgment.  The  solu- 
tion, to  be  satisfactory,  must  contain  two  ideas,  that  of  rest  to  be 
taken,  and  that  of  the  walk  to  be  taken  afterwards.  The  replies 
marked  2  do  not  take  into  consideration  the  necessity  of  the  walk. 

The  replies  marked  3  do  not  take  into  account  the  fatigue. 
The  replies  marked  4  are  contradictory  to  the  sense  of  the  ques- 
tion, or  are  ambiguous  expressions. 

Sixth  question.  When  one  has  missed  the  train  what  must  one  dof 
This  question  is  so  simple  that  it  calls  up  a  reply  almost  automati- 
cally. The  youngest  have  nevertheless  committed  errors  of 
judgment. 

In  the  replies  marked  1  the  form  is  of  little  account.  The  idea 
is  there  and  it  is  correct. 

In  the  replies  marked  2  the  idea  is  vague. 

The  replies  marked  3  are  badly  adapted  to  the  question;  take 
the  omnibus  or  the  trolley  we  are  told;  but  do  we  know  there  is 
one?  As  to  going  home,  is  that  natural  if  one  is  prepared  to  take 
the  train?  And  try  not  to  miss  it  again  is  a  beautiful  suggestion 
when  it  is  already  gone ! 

Seventh  question.  When  one  breaks  something  belonging  to  an- 
other, what  must  one  do?  The  idea  of  paying  or  replacing  the  ob- 
ject, and  of  excusing  one's  self  must  be  indicated  for  the  reply  to 
be  satisfactory. 

Eighth  question.  When  one  finds  that  one's  copy  book  has  been 
stolen  what  must  one  dof  The  correct  solution  is  to  carry  the 
complaint  to  one  in  authority.  Then  a  reply  much  less  appro- 
priate is  to  reply  without  giving  the  authority  to  which  one  com- 
plains. Then — ^to  hunt  for  the  object;  to  replace  it;  are  replies 
still  less  suitable  since  they  apply  to  a  case  where  an  object  has 
been  lost. 

The  replies  marked  4  take  it  for  granted  that  the  thief  is  known. 

Ninth  question.  When  the  house  is  on  fire  what  must  one  dof 
Evidently  one  must  call  the  firemen;  several  had  the  idea  simply 
of  saving  themselves. 


NORMAL   CHILDREN   OF   SEVEN   TO   ELEVEN   YEARS  131 

Tenth  question.  When  one  has  been  struck  by  a  playmate  who  did 
not  mean  to  do  it,  what  must  one  do?  First  comes  the  idea  of  par- 
don; then  absence  of  denunciation.  Next  come  the  replies 
where  the  absence  of  vengeance  is  noted. 

Eleventh  question.  When  one  has  need  of  good  advice  what  must 
one  do?  Evidently  one  must  ask  it  of  a  person  who  has  had  expe- 
rience; this  is  the  first  idea.  To  say  that  one  must  listen  to  it,  is 
to  indicate  an  idea  less  important,  less  adapted  to  the  question. 

Several  replies  are  unintelligible,  probably  because  the  children 
have  not  understood  the  meaning  of  the  word  '' advice."  Here  a 
lack  of  vocabulary  is  responsible. 

Twelfth  question.  When  one  is  lazy  and  does  not  wish  to  work, 
what  happens?  The  replies  are  somewhat  difficult  to  classify  but 
they  are  interesting  to  analyze.  Nearly  all  the  children  under- 
stood the  sense  of  the  question;  but  they  took  different  points  of 
view.  The  smallest,  in  general,  thought  only  of  the  immediate  re- 
sults; that  is,  being  kept  in,  bad  marks,  dunce  cap,  foot  of  the 
class  and  (we  regret  to  have  to  register  this  naive  confession)  the 
blows  given  by  the  teacher.  The  horizon  of  ideas  of  the  older  ones 
is  more  extended;  they  have  foreseen  the  more  distant  but  more 
important  consequences  of  laziness,  that  is  to  say  ignorance,  the 
difficulty  of  earning  a  living,  etc. 

Thirteenth  question.  Why  should  one  not  spend  all  his  money,  hut 
put  some  aside?  Saving  is  necessary  in  view  of  sickness,  age,  lack 
of  work.  This  is  what  the  children  explain  more  or  less  complete- 
ly. Others  affirm  especially  the  advantage  of  useful  expenditure, 
like  buying  necessities,  or  paying  the  rent.  Others  indicate  simply 
the  need  in  which  one  may  later  find  one's  self.  In  general  they 
have  replied  well. 

Fourteenth  question.  When  one  has  received  a  punishment  which 
one  has  not  deserved,  what  must  one  do?  The  best  conduct  under 
such  circiunstances  must  contain  the  association  of  two  things:  the 
protest  and  the  execution  of  the  punishment.  Furthermore,  one 
might  discuss  the  second  point,  whether  it  is  a  duty  to  submit  to 
an  immerited  punishment.  There  is  more  elegance  perhaps  in 
submitting  first  and  protesting  afterwards;  but  that  is  an  affair  of 
appreciation.  We  place  lower  the  refusal  to  execute  the  punish- 
ment. The  child  revolts  against  the  unmerited  character  of  the 
punishment,  but  he  does  not  comprehend  the  line  of  conduct  to 
follow. 


132  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

Fifteenth  question.  Before  deciding  an  important  matter  {prendre 
parti)  what  must  one  dof  The  little  word  "think"  is  the  best  reply. 
There  were  many  absurd  answers.  The  children  have  not  under- 
stood or  thought  it  was  a  question  of  a  pleasure  party  (partie). 

Sixteenth  question.  What  must  one  do  to  earn  10  sous  which  one 
needs?  The  older  children  especially  replied  by  the  commonplace 
remark:  one  must  work,  which  they  remember  from  a  lesson.  We 
prefer  two  typical  replies,  both  given  by  the  younger  children  of 
seven  years  whom  school  had  not  caused  to  forget  life:  "One  must 
sell"  says  one;  "One  must  sing"  says  another.  This  is  a  curious 
bit  of  naive  misery.  These  are  childish  words  that  are  truly 
touching! 

Seventeenth  question.  When  a  person  has  offended  you  and  comes 
to  ask  your  pardon,  what  must  one  dof  It  is  the  pardon  that 
comes  at  once  into  the  mind.  Those  who  have  comprehended 
have  had  this  feeling,  but  often  the  word  has  suggested  their 
thought.  With  intelligences  less  developed,  the  altruistic  idea 
effaces  itself  more  and  more;  there  remains  only  a  neutral  or  nega- 
tive state. 

Eighteenth  question.  If  some  one  asks  your  opinion  of  a  person 
whom  you  know  hut  little,  what  must  one  dof  Several  succeeded  in 
expressing  more  or  less  well  that  ignorance  imposes  discretion; 
others  have  indicated  silence  as  necessary  without  giving  the 
motive. 

Nineteenth  question.  When  two  persons  discuss  a  question  before 
coming  to  an  understanding  about  the  words,  what  happensf  The 
idea  is  subtle  and  the  words  are  not  in  the  vocabulary  of  a  child. 
The  question  was  poorly  understood.  The  child  vaguely  divined 
that  there  had  been  a  conflict,  and  it  was  upon  this  point  that  he 
concentrated  his  attention.  Several  replies  were  marked  1,  but 
with  reservation. 

Twentieth  question.  When  a  person  always  contradicts  you,  no 
matter  what  you  say,  what  must  one  dof  The  replies  are  very 
defective. 

Twenty-first  question.  Why  must  we  judge  a  person  by  his  acts 
rather  than  by  his  words?  The  reply  should  contain  an  indication 
of  the  comparative  value  of  words  and  acts.  Rarely  understood. 
In  the  best  cases  there  is  an  attempt  at  a  parallel.  Lower  down 
merely  words  are  given. 

Twenty-second  question.  Why  does  one  forgive  a  wrong  action 


NORMAL   CHILDREN   OF   SEVEN   TO   EL^^VEN   YEARS  133 

committed  in  anger,  more  easily  than  a  wrong  action  committed 
without  anger?  Good  replies  are  rare.  In  general  the  children 
have  seen  in  anger  an  aggravating  circumstance,  or  the  only  thing 
to  qualify. 

Twenty-third  question.  Why  is  it  better  to  persevere  in  what  has 
been  commenced,  than  to  abandon  it  to  commence  something  else? 
Good  repHes  are  rare.  Most  often  (second  reply)  the  thing  is 
affirmed  without  the  motive  being  given.  Several  give  scholastic 
motives,  indicating  that  their  outlook  is  limited.  There  are  finally 
several  unintelligible  repHes. 

Twenty-fourth  question.  Why  should  we  not  remind  a  person  of 
the  service  which  we  have  rendered  him?  Badly  understood.  Chil- 
dren here  show  their  utilitarian  tendencies;  they  say  we  must  not 
allow  the  person  to  do  us  a  service.  This  is  a  wrong  meaning. 
These  questions  invite  absurd  replies,  which  is  their  principal 
reason  for  being. 

Twenty-fifth  question.  What  should  one  do  when  one  has  committed 
a  wrong  act  which  is  irreparable?  Like  the  preceding  this  question 
invites  absurdities.     Defectives  often  accept  the  invitation. 

The  order  followed  in  the  preceding  list  has  not  been  that  of  the 
difficulty  of  the  questions.  We  have  made  the  calculation  of 
all  the  solutions  given  for  the  first  20  questions  only,  and  we 
have  been  able  to  establish  the  order  of  difficulty  which  will  be 
found  in  the  following  table.  The  most  difficult  question  is  the 
20th;  then  comes  the  7th,  14th,  18th,  etc.  This  order  has  been 
established  in  making  a  synthesis  of  the  replies  given  by  the  three 
different  ages,  of  seven,  nine  and  elevenyears;  if  one  had  taken  into 
account  only  one  of  these  age  groups  a  rather  different  order 
would  have  been  given.  In  this  table  we  have  therefore  sub- 
divided the  questions  into  three  groups,  the  easiest  from  1  to  12, 
those  of  medium  difficulty  from  13  to  19,  finally  the  most  difficult 
from  15  to  20.  In  the  vertical  columns  is  shown  the  number  of 
the  replies,  marked  1  or  2,  or  3,  etc.,  the  silences  (S),  and  the  ab- 
surdities, ambiguities  or  nonsense  (A).  It  will  be  noted  that  for 
the  easiest  questions,  children  of  seven  reply  as  well  as  those  of 
nine  years,  but  children  of  eleven  distinguish  themselves  by  a 
larger  proportion  of  excellent  replies,  marked  1.  For  the  ques- 
tions of  medium  difficulty,  the  three  groups  are  well  differen- 
tiated; the  youngest  have  26  silences,  and  7  absurdities;  the  chil- 
dren of  nine  have  8  silences  and  only  one  absurdity;  those  of  11 


134 


DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 


years  have  only  1  silence  and  no  absurdities.  That  shows  us,  lei 
it  be  said  in  passing,  that  prolonged  silence  is  not  an  indication 
of  reflection,  but  of  ignorance,  an  incapacity  of  replying.     We  had 

Tables  of  Replies  to  Abstract  Questions 


KEPLIES 

QUESTIONS 

Children  of 
7  years 

Children  of 
9  years 

Children  of 
11  years 

1 

2 

3 

4 

S 

A 

1 

2 

3 

4 

s 

A 

1 

2 

3 

4 

s 

A 

Difficult 
20 
7 
14 
18 
15 

Total... 

2 
2 

4 

1 

1 

2 
8 
5 
7 
5 

27 

3 

1 
5 
1 
2 

12 

1 
1 

1 

2 
3 

8 

1 
3 

4 

4 
4 

7 
5 
8 
6 
4 

30 

2 
2 
4 

1 
3 
4 
5 
1 

14 

3 
1 
4 
3 

4 

15 

2 

1 

2 
5 

2 
2 

4 
4 
2 
2 
2 

14 

1 
1 

2 

Medium 
19 
10 

5 
11 

8 
16 

6 
13 

Total 

2 
6 
3 

11 

1 

1 

1 
4 

7 

3 

4 
1 

8 

5 
4 
1 
5 

15 

4 
5 
2 
7 
3 
1 
1 
3 

26 

2 

2 

2 

1 

7 

2 

1 
4 
10 
4 
2 

23 

2 
3 
2 

1 

1 
8 

17 

6 
1 

7 
3 

3 

20 

3 

1 

4 

8 

1 
1 

3 
2 

1 

8 

1 

1 

3 

2 

I 

5 

11 

10 

6 

45 

2 

1 
3 
4 

1 

3 
5 

19 

1 
3 
5 
2 
2 

6 
3 
3 
2 
3 

17 

'3 

1 

5 
2 

2 

9 

1 

1 
1 

Easy 
12 
4 
9 
3 
2 
1 

1 
4 
8 
6 
3 
10 

6 
2 
2 
4 

8 
3 

1 
2 

3 
2 
3 

8 
7 
9 

1 
7 
5 
2 
3 
1 

5 

2 

1 

1 

6 
7 
5 

10 
9 

11 

Total 

32 

14 

11 

3 

33 

19 

7 

1 

1 

48 

13 

4 

1 

~ 

felt  a  theoretical  doubt  in  regard  to  this,  which  the  reading  of  the 
table  on  page  124  dissipates. 

The  table  also  shows  that  absurdities  are  frequent  with  children 
of  seven  years  (there  were  19),  rare  with  children  of  nine  years  (there 


NORMAL   CHILDREN   OF   SEVEN   TO   ELEVEN   YEARS  135 

were  6),  and  exceptional  with  children  of  eleven  years  (2).  We 
have  already  noted  this  fact  in  connection  with  the  repetition  of 
sentences.  It  now  remains  to  arrange  these  data  for  the  individual 
diagnosis.  Space  is  lacking  for  making  all  the  necessary  calcula- 
tions, and  we  shall  reduce  our  indications  to  the  minimum.  It  is 
sufficient  to  reproduce  here  for  each  age,  two  samples  of  their  re- 
plies; one  given  by  a  normal  child  who  represents  the  average 
accuracy;  the  other  given  by  a  normal  child  whose  reply  was  the 
poorest.  These  series  will  serve  as  terms  of  provisional  compari- 
son when  we  shall  have  appreciated  the  type  of  reply  of  the  sub- 
normal; we  shall  see  if  it  is  above  the  average  or  below,  or  at  least 
below  the  least  intelligent  of  the  normals,  for  the  given  age. 

Le ,  eleven  years,  normal,  gave  the  poorest  replies.     3 

absurdities,  5  silences,  4  replies  marked  3  and  4. 

1.  One  must  sleep,  1. 

2.  One  must  get  warm,  1. 

3.  One  must  hurry,  2. 

5.  One  must  rest,  1. 

6.  One  must  take  the  other,  1. 

7.  One  must  replace  it,  2. 

8.  One  must  replace  it,  4. 

9.  One  must  escape,  2. 

10.  One  must  pardon  him,  1. 

11.  One  must  listen  to  it,  3. 

12.  One  must  work,  3. 

13.  For  later,  2. 

14.  (Silence). 

15.  (Silence.) 

16.  One  must  work,  2. 

17.  (Silence.) 

18.  One  must  ask  for  it.    A. 

19.  It  happens  that  one  knows  nothing,  2. 

20.  (Silence.) 

21.  (Silence.) 

22.  Because  an  action  without  anger,  one  can  forgive  it,  while  an  action 
with  anger  one  can  forgive  it,  A. 

23.  Because  when  one  commences  it  is  not  so  hard  as  at  the  end,  3. 

24.  Because  of  the  service  which  one  has  given  is  better  one  must  keep 
it,  A. 

25.  One  ought  to  try  to  make  it  all  right,  3. 

Debra ,  eleven  years,  normal,  gave  rephes  of  average  value. 

0  absurdities,  0  silence,  5  replies  marked  3  and  4. 


136  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

1.  One  must  go  to  bed,  1. 

2.  One  must  cover  one's  self  well  so  as  to  avoid  taking  cold,  1 

3.  One  must  hurry  more  than  usual  so  as  to  arrive  in  time,  1. 

4.  One  must  take  an  umbrella,  1. 

5.  One  must  go  on  foot,  3. 

6.  One  must  wait  for  another  train,  1. 

7.  One  must  pay  for  it,  2. 

8.  One  must  tell  the  teacher,  1. 

9.  One  must  try  to  get  away,  2. 

10.  One  must  not  denounce  him,  3. 

11.  One  must  ask  one's  parents,  1. 

12.  One  does  nothing,  and  one  cannot  earn  a  living,  1. 

13.  With  economy  one  has  something  to  fall  back  on  when  one  is  old,  1. 

14.  One  must  consider  it,  1. 

15.  One  must  not  disobey;  one  must  do  it,  3. 

16.  One  must  work,  1.  ♦ 

17.  One  must  not  fight,  3. 

18.  One  should  say:  I  do  not  know  that  person  well  enough  to  give  you 
any  opinion  about  him,  1. 

19.  It  happens  that  they  fight,  3. 

20.  One  must  let  him  talk,  2. 

21.  Because  one  cannot  believe  what  is  said,  but  when  one  sees,  one  be- 
lieves always,  1. 

22.  One  pardons  a  bad  act  committed  in  anger,  because  right  away  he 
remembers  he  ought  not  to  have  done  it,  while  a  wrong  act  done  without 
anger  remains  a  long  time  in  the  hearts,  1. 

23.  It  is  better  to  continue  a  task  begun  because  in  another  it  will  be 
more  difficult  to  do  it,  3. 

24.  Because  one  ought  not  to  have  done  it.     That  is  unkind,  1. 

25.  One  must  go  into  another  country,  2. 

Altm ,  child  of  nine  years,  gave  very  bad  replies.  0  ab- 
surdities, 13  silences,  1  reply  marked  3. 

1.  One  must  go  to  bed,  1. 

2.  One  must  cover  up,  1. 

3.  One  must  hurry,  1. 

4.  One  must  shelter  oneself,  2. 

5.  One  must  sit  down,  2. 

6.  (Silence). 

7.  One  must  buy  another,  2. 

8.  (Silence). 

9.  Go  for  the  firemen,  1. 

10.  (Silence). 

11.  (Silence). 

12.  One  knows  nothing,  1. 

13.  Without  that  one  could  not  live,  2. 

14.  (Silence). 


NORMAL   CHILDREN   OF   SEVEN   TO   ELEVEN    YEARS  137 

15.  (Silence). 

16.  One  must  work,  1. 

17.  (Silence). 

18.  (Silence). 

19.  They  fight,  3. 

20.  (Silence). 

21.  (Silence). 

22.  (Silence). 

23.  (Silence). 

24.  (Silence). 

25.  One  should  ask  pardon,  1. 

Barr ,  nine  years,  gave  replies  of  average  value.  0  absurd- 
ities, 7  silences,  5  replies  marked  3  and  4. 

1.  One  undresses  and  goes  to  bed,  1. 

2.  One  must  dress  up  warm,  1. 

3.  One  must  hurry  all  the  way,  1. 

4.  One  must  find  shelter,  one  mu^t  stay  at  the  school  so  as  not  to  get 
wet,  2. 

5.  One  must  rest  on  a  bench,  2. 

6.  One  must  wait  and  take  another  train,  1. 

7.  One  must  replace  it,  2. 

8.  One  must  tell  the  teacher,  1. 

9.  One  must  get  away  so  as  not  to  get  burned,  2. 

10.  One  must  not  give  him  back  what  he  did  to  us  so  as  not  to  do  evil,  4. 

11.  One  must  listen  to  it,  3. 

12..  One  soon  becomes  the  last  of  one's  class,  3. 

13.  Because  when  one  is  older  one  cannot  work,  and  will  have  nothing 
to  live  on,  1. 

14.  (Silence). 

15.  One  must  say  it,  2. 

16.  One  must  work,  1. 

17.  One  must  be  reconciled  with  them,  1. 

18.  They  both  get  angry,  3. 

19.  (Silence). 

20.  (Silence). 

21.  (Silence). 

22.  (Silence). 

23.  (Silence). 

24.  (Silence). 

25.  One  must  correct  it,  3. 

Another  indication  may  be  helpful.  The  average  number  of 
absurdities  among  children  of  11  years  (for  the  above  25  ques- 
tions) is  0.5;  the  maximum  number  is  2. 

For  children  of  nine  years,  the  average  number  is  1  and  ^  the 
maximum  number  is  3. 


138 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 


For  children  of  seven  years,  the  average  number  needs  correc- 
tion; it  would  be  20,  if  one  admitted  in  the  calculation  two  chil- 
dren, rather  extraordinary,  who  committed  a  great  many  absurdi- 
ties. If  they  are  eliminated,  there  are  only  6,  which  makes  a 
trifle  less  than  one  absurdity  for  each  pupil,  with  a  maximum  of  2. 
The  number  of  silences  varies  equally.  It  is  2  on  an  average  at 
eleven  years  with  a  maximum  of  5.  It  is  5  on  an  average  at  nine 
years,  with  a  maximum  of  12.  It  is  6.5  on  an  average  at  seven 
years,  with  a  maximum  of  11. 


Tables  of  Replies 

lo  Abstract  Questions 

SILENCES 

ABSURDITIES 

Average 
number 

Maximum 
number 

Average 
number 

Maximum 
number 

Seven  years 

6.5 
5.0 
2.0 

11 

12 
5 

1* 
1 

0.5 

2 

Nine  years  .... 

3 

Eleven  years 

2 

*  This  is  a  corrected  average  be  it  remembered 


Search  for  rhymes.  A  few  words  only  upon  this  test,  which  we 
tried  with  only  five  children  of  seven  years,  five  of  nine  and  five  of 
eleven  years.  At  seven  years,  no  one  can  find  a  word  to  rhyme 
"  ob^issance^'  and  the  words  they  find  after  much  pains  have  no 
bearing  upon  the  questions.  At  nine  years  they  understand  bet- 
ter, and  after  a  minute^s  search,  they  can  find  at  least  one  rhyme, 
sometimes  two,  three  or  four.  At  eleven  years,  a  rather  larger 
number  is  found. 

Abstract  definitions.  Still  another  incomplete  attempt  upon  five 
children  of  each  age.  At  least  we  have  been  able  to  prove  that 
even  at  twelve  years,  a  normal  cannot  express  the  difference  be- 
tween certain  abstract  terms.  In  his  desire  to  give  some  sort  of  a 
reply  he  says  absurdities.  Here  are  some  examples,  which  will 
suffice  to  enlighten  us,  mixed  with  certain  attempts  which  contain 

a  ghmpse  of  a  correct  idea.     Deron ,  Esteem  and  affection. 

Esteem  when  one  speaks  well  of  someone  who  is  not  there,  and 

affection,  is  to  love  some  one.     Fleur ,  Weariness  and  sadness. 

In  sadness,  one  despairs,  but  in  weariness,  one  wishes  amusement. 
That  distinction  is  not  at  all  bad.  Esteem  someone,  one  almost 
loves  them,  and  in  affection  one  loves  them.     HalU ,  Whe 


INSTITUTION   CASES  139 

one  'esteems  someone,  one  loves  them.     When  one  has  affection, 

one  loves  also.     Bari ,  Esteem  is  love;  affection  one  says  one 

loves. 

Combination  of  three  words  in  the  same  sentence.  Still  another 
test  which  lack  of  time  has  not  permitted  us  to  perfect.  It  is 
only  at  twelve  years  that  we  note  the  first  attempts,  and  they  are 
very  imperfect.  Out  of  five  children  there  were  only  three  who 
were  able  in  two  minutes  of  work  to  bring  out  the  following  sen- 
tences.    Halli ,  Paris  is  a  large  city  where  there  are  gutters; 

and  where  the  people  have  little  fortune. 

Fleur ,  In  Paris,  by  jumping  a  gutter,  I  found  a  little  fortune. 

Bari ,  In  the  city  of  Paris,  ihere  are  gutters,  where  one  can 

find  his  fortune. 

Remember  that  no  one  told  them  how  to  go  to  work.  If  a 
model  sentence  had  been  given,  doubtless  they  could  have  passed 
the  test. 

Verbal  blanks  to  be  filled.  Last  test  which  was  tried  on  only  five 
children  of  seven,  five  of  nine,  and  five  of  twelve  years.  The  re- 
sults were  analogous  to  those  which  were  obtained  with  abstract 
questions.  It  is  therefore  useless  to  describe  them  here,  as  that 
would  be  mere  repetition.  But  for  the  examination  of  a  particular 
child,  these  repetitions  are  very  useful;  that  which  is  wearisome 
in  a  description  renders  great  service  in  practice. 

We  have  now  established  certain  demarcations  which  permit  us 
to  recognize  the  normal  development  of  intelligence  among  chil- 
dren, and  above  all  to  know  when  a  child  who  is  suspected  of  re- 
tardation, appears  really  backward  as  compared  with  children  of 
his  own  age. 

We  shall  not  here  describe  the  process  to  follow  for  each  compari- 
son; we  can  do  it  more  successfully  in  the  next  section,  where  we 
speak  of  backward  children. 

Enough  of  theory,  let  it  give  place  now  to  the  demonstration." 

II.  Institution  Cases -^y 

Before  showing  how  the  psychological  method  permits  us  to 
recognize  and  in  a  certain  way  to  classify  backward  children  in  the 
schools,  we  wish  to  show  what  help  it  offers  to  doctors  in  an  insti- 
tution.    The  diagnosis  of  intellectual  inferiority  is  made  in  sub- 

^^  See  page  64. 


140  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

stantially  the  same  manner  in  the  school  as  in  the  institution;  only 
the  children  in  institutions  are  in  general  more  seriously  affected 
than  those  in  schools;  the  true  idiots  are  reserved  for  the  institu- 
i^ions  as  we  believe  that  they  will  rarely  be  admitted  into  a  school. 
Thisrefore  the  tests  to  be  submitted  to  children  in  an  institution 
are  slightly  ^different  from  those  to  be  used  in  schools. 

In  theSj3L^t(^ution  as  in  the  school,  two  questions  are  to  be 
solved;  first /iMche  child  inferior  ii  intelligence?  Second,  to  what 
degree  is  he  infenbiwtjO  the  normal? 

The  first  of  these  qu5si|M|sis  most  important  for  the  teacher, 
who  must  above  everythin^lttM^come  expert  in  making  the 
distinction  between  normal  and  suMbrmal,  an  extremely  delicate 
task,  because  many  of  the  morons  whom  it  will  be  interesting  to 
recognize,  closely  approach  normality.  This  distinction  once 
made,  the  operation  is  almost  finished,  because  the  school  serves 
only  to  conceal  the  morons.  The  attention  of  the  clinician  is 
differently  directed.  The  important  question  for  him  is  not  so 
much  whether  the  child  presented  to  him  is  normal  or  subnormal; 
ordinarily  this  question  is,  as  it  were,  settled  in  advance  because 
of  the  gravity  of  the  mental  defect  of  the  subject.  Even  parents, 
or  an  attendant,  would  be  capable  of  recognizing  that  an  idiot  or 
an  imbecile  is  not  normal;  at  least  this  is  true  in  most  cases.^^ 

What  the  physician  seeks  with  the  greatest  care  is  the  differ- 
ential diagnosis  of  idiot,  imbecile  and  moron. 

Consequently  in  the  following  pages  we  shall  specially  occupy 
ourselves  in  classifying  the  children  in  one  of  these  three  sub- 
divisions; we  shall  hope  to  demonstrate  that  the  application  of  the 
psychological  method  to  subnormals  in  an  institution,  gives  re- 
sults both  rapid  and  exact. 

The  children  of  whom  we  are  about  to  speak  were  all  examined 
in  the  Salpetri^re  under  the  direction  of  Dr.  Voisin,  during  the 
months  of  February  and  March,  1905.  Dr.  Voisin  was  good 
enough  to  open  his  establishment  to  us,  with  a  liberality  and  dis- 
interestedness which  could  only  be  equalled  by  his  attachment  for* 
the  inmates  of  the  Salp^tri^re,  whom  he  calls  with  an  eloquent 

^2  There  are  some  exceptions  to  this  rule.  It  is  easy  to  imagine  that 
some  parents,  wishing  to  rid  themselves  of  the  care  and  expense  of  the  edu- 
cation of  the  child,  should  seek  to  have  him  admitted  although  normal  to 
the  special  care  for  backward  children.  It  is  the  business  of  the  doctor 
to  know  whether  or  not  the  child  presented  to  him  is  normal. 


INSTITUTION   CASES  141 

simplicity,  ''his  children."  We  found  the  same  welcome  from 
Madame  Meusy,  who  directs  the  school  connected  with  the  estab- 
lishment; she  was  present  at  all  of  our  experiments,  aiding  us  by 
her  knowledge  of  the  children,  showing  always  toward  them  that 
sweetness,  that  sensibility  without  sentimentality  which  makes 
her  such  a  sjnnpathetic  teacher. 

Nearly  all  of  the  children  were  examined  in  her  office.  Several, 
however,  belonging  to  the  lowest  grades,  were  seen  in  the  halls 
where  they  habitually  stay.  All  the  others  came  to  us  one  by  one. 
Doubtless  this  is  not  a  faultless  clinical  method.  It  would  often 
be  interesting  to  observe  the  child  in  the  very  center  where  he 
lives;  and  in  modifyixig  his  external  surroundings  as  little  as  pos- 
sible, his  spontaneity  would  best  display  itself.  But  after  all,  it 
is  not  this  that  we  are  looking  for;  the  individual  method,  freed 
from  all  accidental  outside  distraction,  is  practically  indispensable 
for  a  minutely  accurate  mental  analysis.  The  child  when  isolated 
has  more  timidity  and  reserve.  But  on  the  other  hand  one  obtains 
a  more  sustained  attention.  The  office  of  Madame  Meusy  was 
for  all  these  children  a  familiar  place,  which  they  seldom  left 
without  a  bonbon.  Each  child  was  brought  by  a  teacher,  or  by 
an  attendant  with  whom  the  child  was  familiar.  Since  Madame 
Meusy  was  always  present  the  child  remained  in  familiar  territory. 
Let  us  note,  by  the  way,  that  the  silence  was  only  relative,  be- 
cause of  the  proximity  of  the  class  room.  For  certain  tests  re- 
quiring concentrated  attention,  like  that  of  the  repetition  of  six 
figures,  this  might  sometimes  be  a  cause  of  trouble,  but  in  other 
cases  our  tests  leave  the  child  so  little  to  himself  that  this  fact  did 
not  prove  a  serious  inconvenience. 

One  of  us  questioned  and  the  other  wrote  the  replies,  or  noted 
the  attitude,  the  play  of  the  countenance  of  the  child  who  was  be- 
ing questioned.  The  examination  took  on,  by  the  way,  more  the 
air  of  a  game  conducted  without  dry  formulas,  and  the  child  was 
always  encourr.ged.  It  goes  without  saying  that  his  replies  were 
never  ridiculed  no  matter  how  incorrect  they  were;  he  was  given 
the  credit  of  his  willingness  to  try.  For  any  one  who  knows  these 
poor  beings  and  realizes  to  what  degree  they  open  out  when  praised 
and  on  the  contrary,  how  quickly  they  withdraw  within  them- 
selves at  the  least  reproof,  there  is  no  doubt  that  this  indulgent 
attitude  is  indispensable  to  obtain  on  their  part  even  a  small  output 
of  effort.     With  a  few  exceptions,  of  which  we  shall  speak  as  we 


142  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

go  along,  all  have  lent  themselves  with  docility,  some  even  with 
good  grace  to  our  investigations.  Among  some  fifty  children  ex- 
amined, only  one  or  two  offered  any  obstacle  which  came  from  the 
disposition,  that  is  to  say,  from  ill-will  and  not  from  the  lack  of 
intelligence;  this  small  number  is  an  important  fact;  it  proves 
without  question  that  our  methods  of  examination,  even  though 
they  require  the  active  cooperation  of  the  subject,  are  nevertheless 
practically  possible.  What  examination,  by  the  way,  would  be 
able  to  dispense  with  the  cooperation  of  the  one  who  is  its  subject? 
Even  a  physical  examination  is  rendered  impracticable  by  cries  and 
incessant  movements.  A  priori  it  was  to  be  expected  that  even 
more  difficulties  would  present  themselves  in  psychological  inves- 
tigations. Such  has  not  been  the  case.  Subnormal  children  have 
submitted  themselves  willingly  to  these  investigations  and  those 
cases  of  opposition  which  we  did  encounter  were  not  significant  for 
we  have  met  and  noted  similar  ones  among  normal  school  children. 
Naturally  when  such  difficulties  present  themselves,  one  cannot 
draw  conclusions  from  a  single  sitting;  one  should  return  at  a 
more  favorable  moment.  But  the  rarity  of  these  occurrences 
leaves  no  doubt  that  they  can  be  overcome. 

In  examining  the  replies  of  subnormal  children  of  the  Salpe- 
triere,  it  will  be  seen  that  they  permit  us  to  separate  our  subjects 
into  distinct  groups  and  subgroups.^^  But  what  significance  shall 
we  attribute  to  these?  They  are  only  schematic  divisions  and 
probably  susceptible  to  further  rearrangement.  It  must  not  be 
considered  that  as  they  stand  we  feel  they  completely  delimit 
moronity,  imbecility,  and  idiocy.  Even  while  taking  account 
only  of  the  development  of  the  intellectual  faculties  properly  so- 
called  and  limiting  ourselves  to  a  study  of  the  degree  of  intelli- 
gence, from  the  very  first  one  meets  many  difficulties,  among  the 
principal  of  which  is  the  following.  Here  is  a  child  of  twelve  years, 
who  does  not  know  how  to  apply  to  the  objects  which  he  sees  the 
words  which  he  hears  and  which  he  pronounces;  the  majority  of 
children  of  two  and  three  years  can  already  do  this;  he  presents 
therefore  a  retardation  of  ten  years.     Then  here  is  another  child 

^'  In  spite  of  the  number  of  children  examined  our  work  takes  into  ac- 
count only  about  thirty,  as  we  have  been  able  to  use  only  those  upon  whom 
we  have  made  a  sufficient  number  of  tests  and  we  did  not  know  this  until 
the  work  was  finished.  The  grades  of  others  are  somewhat  uncertain  and 
it  will  be  necessary  to  test  them  again. 


'  INSTITUTION   CASES  143 

of  the  same  degree  of  intelligence  who  is  four  years  old ;  he  is  only- 
two  years  behind  children  of  his  own  age.  Are  we  not  justified 
in  taking  into  account  this  enormous  difference  of  age?  Would  it 
be  right  to  say  that  these  two  children,  because  they  have  the  same 
intellectual  level,  both  belong  to  the  same  category,  and  that  the 
younger  is  an  idiot  in  the  same  way  as  the  older?  Are  we  not  going 
to  see  on  the  contrary,  that  the  child  of  four  years  will  later  make 
progress,  and  soon  no  longer  merit  to  be  classed  with  the  other, 
change  his  group,  and  rise  to  imbecility? 

It  will  therefore  be  necessary  to  introduce  two  factors :  the  intel- 
lectual level  and  the  age  of  the  subject.  Only,  to  do  this,  many 
questions  must  be  settled  whose  solution  is  today  completely  in 
suspense.  The  psychological  development  of  the  normal  child 
had  hardly  been  touched  upon ;  the  present  work  contains  the  first 
attempt  in  this  regard.  We  have  at  least  seen  which  tests  were 
possible  at  the  different  ages,  and  which  on  the  contrary  could  not 
be  determined  upon.  Nothing  as  yet  has  been  attempted  for  the 
subnormal  states  and  the  difficulty  is  very  great.  As  to  what  con- 
cerns school  children  it  is  possible  to  determine  this  development 
of  the  intellectual  faculties  according  to  age,  by  the  average  re- 
sults obtained  with  different  groups,  chosen  from  the  same  social 
condition,  the  same  educational  environment.  One  of  the  factors, 
that  of  mental  capacity — is  quite  constant.  For  subnormals  sim- 
ilar to  those  of  the  Salpetriere  similar  averages  would  be  of  no 
value,  because  subnormals  differ  too  much  among  themselves  to 
permit  of  substituting  one  for  the  other  in  taking  averages.  It 
would  be  necessary  to  follow  individually  very  many  subjects  in 
their  development,  to  see  if  the  states  of  intellectual  inferiority 
are  caused  by  arrested  development,  or  by  very  slow  evolution 
continued  irregularly  or  intermittently,  or  to  see  if  some  essential 
faculties  could  increase  while  others  remained  stationary  or  un- 
awakened.  It  would  be  impossible,  before  these  facts  are  ascer- 
tained, to  compare  these  subjects  with  normal  children  age  for  age, 
year  for  year,  detail  for  detail.  No  doubt  it  is  possible — perhaps 
even  probable — that  a  child  who  at  five  years  has  scarcely  the 
intellectual  level  of  a  child  of  two,  will  be  the  same  at  ten  or  fifteen 
years.  Without  doubt  one  can  suppose  that  the  cerebral  defects 
which  have  thus  far  prevented  the  acquisition  of  ordinary  ideas, 
would  remain  a  definite  obstacle.  But  we  have  no  right,  without 
the  facts,  to  affirm  this.     And  no  actual  test  can  tell  us,  moreover, 


144  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

whether  an  idiot  is  or  is  not  capable  of  improvement  and  to  just 
what  point.^* 

It  is  a  pity  that  the  fundamental  questions  of  psycholgeny,  so 
easy  to  elucidate  in  institutions  where  the  same  defective  children 
are  retained  ten  an4  twenty  years,  have  never  yet  been  studied 
except  in  vague  statistics! 

All  these  children  have  been  classified  entirely  without  regard 
to  age.  We  have  supposed,  whatever  their  age,  that  they  have 
attained  their  entire  development;  we  have  taken  into  considera- 
tion only  their  actual  state,  the  day  on  which  we  saw  them,  as 
though  it  were  a  fixed  thing,  and  as  though  we  had  to  take  no  ac- 
count of  the  age  they  have  attained,  nor  if  later  they  might  de- 
velop further.  But  under  all  these  reservations,  and  although  in  a 
manner  somewhat  arbitrary,  relative  and  partial,  it  still  seems 
that,  the  intellectual  development  being  supposed  finished,  one  can 
propose  from  this  unique  point  of  view  to  establish  categories 
among  them. 

How  many  principal  categories  must  be  formulated?    A  priori 

^*  A  single  indication  quite  confusing  seems  to  come  out  of  a  work  which 
we  have  just  finished  upon  the  pedagogical  results  of  the  work  of  M.  Bourne- 
ville  at  the  Bicetre.  Our  learned  colleague  put  at  our  disposal  the  records 
of  the  years,  1900,  '02,  '03,  '04,  containing  notes  on  the  dismissals  that  oc- 
curred in  his  service.  In  working  up  these  results  into  tables  we  arrived  at  a 
few  interesting  points.  There  is  no  doubt  some  optimism  in  the  statements 
published  by  M.  Bourneville.  He  does  not  consider  that  any  boy  under  his 
care  shows  deterioration  and  the  lowest  mark  that  he  gives  a  boy  is  that  of 
"m^me  6tat"  (no  change).  He  records  nothing  but  conditions  of  "m^me 
^tat"  and  conditions  of  improvement  which  surprises  those  a  little  who 
know  that  epilepsy  with  repeated  attacks  almost  surely  brings  mental 
deterioration  and  there  is  a  great  deal  of  epilepsy  at  the  Bicetre.  This 
medical  optimism  appears  also  in  a  large  number  of  cases  of  improvement 
which  are  noted  among  subjects  who  become  adults  or  are  transferred  to 
other  institutions.  These  cannot,  however,  be  more  than  slight  improve- 
ments and  without  social  significance  since  most  of  the  subjects  in  ques- 
tion are  bound  to  remain  confined.  Granted  that  leniency  was  exercised 
in  counting  up  the  cases,  it  is  of  greater  significance  to  acknowledge  that 
the  number  of  socalled  improved  idiots  who  are  pointed  out  to  us  is  ex- 
tremely small;  most  of  them  remain  unimproved.  Here  are  the  propor- 
tions. Improved  idiots  24;  unimproved  52.  But  on  the  other  hand,  not- 
withstanding the  length  of  time  and  the  evident  leniency  of  the  doctor  in 
charge,  we  are  compelled  to  acknowledge  a  total  absence  of  improvement 
among  two-thirds  of  the  idiots.  It  is  fair  to  conclude  that  the  intellectual 
condition  of  the  idiot  does  not  tend  to  improve.  But  we  repeat — data  of 
this  kind  are  too  vague  to  become  authoritative  in  science. 


INSTITUTION  CASES  145 

it  would  seem  that  there  is  no  good  reason  to  form  one  number  of 
categories  any  more  than  another,  and  the  determination  of  these 
numbers,  whatever  they  be,  is  open  to  criticism  in  about  the  same 
manner  and  for  the  same  reason  that  one  can  criticize  the  physicist, 
who  has  fixed  the  number  of  the  colors  of  the  spectrum  at  seven, 
when  one  could  describe  ten  colors  or  twenty.  In  the  same  way 
one  could  describe  five  or  ten  different  degrees  or  more,  of  intel- 
lectual inferiority.  Every  continued  series  permits  an  infinite 
number  of  divisions.  But  for  practical  use  it  becomes  necessary 
to  restrict  the  number;  moreover  in  medical  language  the  three 
terms,  idiot,  imbecile,  and  moron,  are  already  in  use  (refer  to 
footnote  on  moron,  p.  41);  it  would  be  very  difficult  not  only 
to  reject  this  classification,  but  even  to  simplify  it  by  the  suppres- 
sion of  one  of  the  terms,  or  to  complicate  it  by  the  introduction  of 
a  new  term.  It  is  therefore  simply  for  reasons  of  convenience 
that  we  accept  a  triplicate  division  of  inferior  intelHgence.  It 
remains  to  be  determined  where  we  shall  place  our  limits  separat- 
ing idiot  from  imbecile,  imbecile  from  moron,  and  lastly  moron 
from  normal.  We  reserve  the  term  idiot  for  subjects  without  a 
vocabulary.  We  do  not  wish  to  say  by  that,  that  they  do  not 
pronounce  certain  words,  but  they  are  incapable  of  passing  from 
the  object  to  the  word,  or  even  from  the  word  to  the  object.  One 
of  the  best  tests  upon  which  to  form  a  judgment,  is  to  ask  them  to 
designate  in  a  picture  the  objects  which  one  names  for  them.  The 
test  is  so  much  the  more  to  be  recommended  because  it  has  for  the 
normal  child  the  great  attraction  of  curiosity.  There  is  also  a 
great  advantage  in  asking  him  to  point  out  the  objects  corre- 
sponding to  the  words  which  are  said  to  him,  rather  than  to  make 
him  name  the  objects  which  he  himself  sees,  because  of  the  defects 
of  pronunciation  which  often  prevent  him  from  being  understood. 
This  is  a  test  that  normal  children  pass  between  two  and  three 
years.  Before  that,  the  child  has  no  relations,  by  language,  with 
those  who  surround  him.  To  reserve  the  name  of  idiocy  to  those 
who  persist  in  that  state  of  social  isolation  is  in  reality  to  cling  to 
the  strict  etymological  sense  of  the  word,  for  the  word  idiot, 
properly  speaking  means  alone,  isolated. 

We  regret  that  there  is  no  distinction  equally  precise  between 
imbecile  and  moron.  Nevertheless  it  has  seemed  to  us  that,  to  be 
able  to  appreciate  and  express  a  difference  existing  between  two 
familiar  objects,  to  compare  weights,  to  find  rhymes,  and  when 


146  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

asked  to  repeat  six  figures,  not  to  repeat  a  series  at  random  or  to 
say  an  absurdity — that  is  to  say,  anything  which  requires  of  the 
subject,  a  precise  comprehension  of  what  is  asked  of  him  and  a  Ht- 
tle  judgment — would  never  accord  itself  with  a  state  of  imbecility. 
It  is  therefore  these  tests  which  will  serve  as  limits. 

Lastly  we  have  noticed  that  children  of  twelve  years  can  mostly 
reply  to  abstract  questions.  We  limit  provisionally  mental  de- 
fect at  this  point.  A  moron  shows  himself  by  his  inability  to 
handle  verbal  abstractions;  he  does  not  understand  them  suffi- 
ciently to  reply  satisfactorily. 

These  three  groups  are  not  of  homogeneous  composition  and 
one  has  often  experienced  the  necessity  of  subdividing  them.  We 
shall  therefore  push  the  analysis  that  far  but  without  inventing 
new  terms.  It  would  seem  proper,  in  order  to  distinguish  each 
group,  to  precede  the  generic  name  by  an  adjective  designating 
the  subdivision,  that  is  to  say,  the  species.  Unfortunately  those 
proposed  up  to  the  present  time  are  not  suitable.  The  terms 
complete  idiocy  and  profound  idiocy  have  been  used;  but  this 
distinction  is  lacking  in  immediate  clarity,  because  one  cannot 
see  which  is  more  serious  for  an  idiot  to  be  complete  or  to  be  pro- 
found. Somewhat  clearer  terms,  complete  and  incomplete,  de- 
veloped by  negation  give  the  insufficient  number  of  two  degrees. 
We  prefer  to  risk  some  more  expressive  terms,  examples  of  which 
will  be  found  farther  on. 

We  shall  now  pass  in  review  successively,  these  three  different 
groups  of  children.  We  shall  sometimes  precede  the  record  of  the 
tests  given  to  each  child  by  certain  cHnical  notes.  But  the  reader 
will  be  so  good  as  to  remember,  that  we  are  not  giving  here  com- 
plete, or  even  psychological  observations,  but  simply  fragments 
chosen  with  the  view  of  illustrating  a  method.  We  present  noth- 
ing but  incomplete  groups. 

IDIOTS 

Without  Use  of  Language 

In  the  first  group,  we  must  note  that  the  absence  of  language 
on  the  part  of  the  child  places  the  experimenter  in  a  rather  diffi- 
cult situation.  The  means  of  producing  psychological  reaction 
is  necessarily  more  vague,  more  undetermined.  The  technique 
of  each  test  is  less  precise;  above  all  else  the  replies,  consisting  in 


INSTITUTION   CASES — IDIOTS  147 

gestures,  in  attitudes,  and  in  acts,  require  more  interpretation. 
Here  especially  can  be  seen  how  necessary  is  the  word  in  order  to 
bring  out  the  thought. 

We  call  to  mind  that  the  tests  which  constitute  this  group  are 
the  following:  reaction  to  light  and  to  sound;  prehension  after 
tactile  excitation;  prehension  after  visual  perception;  distinction 
between  what  is  food  and  what  is  not;  imitations  of  movements 
and  execution  of  simple  orders  through  word  and  mimicry. 

All  these  tests  are  accomplished  by  children  of  two  or  three 
years.  The  average  chronological  age  of  the  subnormals  studied 
by  us  and  which  we  place  in  this  group,  is  about  ten  years  with  a 
variation  of  seven  to  twelve.  The  least  retardation  is  therefore 
of  five  years,  and  consequently  enormous. 

According  to  the  tests  accomplished,  it  is  possible  to  distinguish 
among  these  children  four  subgroups  which  seem  to  correspond 
equally  to  the  degrees  of  intelligence. 

To  find  analogies  among  normals  for  the  several  extreme  cases 
which  we  are  going  to  present,  it  would  be  necessary  to  visit  infant 
hospitals  or  even  to  study  the  child  when  only  a  few  days  old. 
There  are  indeed  among  subnormals  whom  we  have  studied, 
beings  eight  or  ten  years  old,  whose  intelligence  does  not  exceed 
that  of  a  child  of  eight  days. 

We  shall  therefore  indicate  our  degrees,  with  the  qualifications 
which  we  consider  the  most  appropriate. 

1.  Vegetative  idiot.  We  thus  name  those  who  show  no  mani- 
festation of  ideas  of  relationships.  We  have  so  far  observed  none 
of  this  type. 

2.  Idiot  with  visual  coordination.  This  is  the  one  that  looks  at 
an  object,  follows  it  with  his  eyes.  One  could  also  have  the  idiot 
who  hears,  smells,  etc.  We  therefore  use  here  the  reaction  to 
light  and  sound. 

We  have  found  only  one  subject  whose  intellectual  manifesta- 
tions sought  for  in  this  manner,  are  limited  to  habitual  reaction  to 
light  and  sound. 

Gro.  is  a  child  of  twelve.  She  has  two  club  feet  and  cannot  move  her 
lower  limbs,  she  holds  one  hand  in  the  other,  the  fingers  scratching  the 
palms  without  ceasing,  and  at  the  same  time  she  gnaws  continuously  the 
back  of  her  right  hand. 

Let  us  now  see  what  strictly  has  to  bear  upon  our  examination. 
When  the  bell  is  rung  behind  her  head,  no  reaction  can  be  noted. 


148  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

If  one  passes  the  hand  rapidly  before  her  eyes,  she  blinks  with  her 
eyelids;  one  can  even  notice  at  intervals  a  short,  spontaneous  look. 
She  sees  the  lighted  match  before  her  and  turns  her  eyes  to  follow 
it;  but  still  it  is  only  for  a  short  time  and  her  attention  has  little 
persistence.  There  is  no  attempt  at  prehension  either  when  an 
object  is  presented  to  her  or  when  it  is  placed  in  her  hand. 

Thus  there  is  in  this  case  a  single  intellectual  manifestation,  a 
fugitive  attention  to  something  which  glitters;  without  doubt  this 
expression,  fugitive  attention,  remains  vague,  but  its  application 
to  a  precise  fact  does  not  permit  us,  so  it  seems,  to  deceive  our- 
selves upon  the  conditions  under  which  its  use  could  be  authorized. 

Finally  let  us  notice  the  fact  that  Gro reacts  only  to  light 

and  not  to  sound.  Perhaps  it  would  be  wise  under  these  circum- 
stances, to  still  subdivide  this  first  degree,  but  we  have  not  enough 
facts  to  establish  this. 

3.  Idiot  with  prehension.  This  is  the  one  who  can  perform  an 
act  of  prehension.  There  are  here  two  degrees.  The  first  is  pre- 
hension after  tactile  excitation. 

This  group  is  characterized  by  an  acquisition  beyond  that  of 
the  preceding  group — namely,  the  power  to  seize  an  object  when 
it  comes  in  contact  with  the  hand.  We  have  found  only  one 
child  whose  ability  was  limited  to  this  additional  test. 

Rich is  a  child  of  seven  years.     She  sucks  her  thumb,  shakes  her 

head,  grasps  her  arm  and  carries  it  to  her  mouth ;  all  these  movements  indi- 
cate that  she  is  not,  properly  speaking,  paralyzed;  nevertheless  she  does 
not  walk. 

Let  us  see  how  she  conducts  herself  with  our  tests. 

She  starts  and  laughs  when  we  ring  a  bell  behind  her  ear,  but 
does  not  turn  her  head  to  look. 

She  follows  a  lighted  match  with  her  eyes. 

If  an  object  is  presented  to  her,  she  does  not  seem  to  know  how 
to  direct  her  arms  to  take  it  so  long  as  she  is  guided  by  sight  only; 
she  may  strike  it  accidently;  mare  frequently  she  seizes  it,  as  it  were 
by  reflex  only,  when  the  thing  is  placed  in  her  hands. 

She  carries  a  piece  of  wood  to  her  mouth  just  as  naturally  as  a 
bonbon. 

These  are  the  only  tests  that  can  be  given  her.  Her  rank  is 
clearly  indicated  to  us  as  in  the  third  group.  Prehension  which 
does  not  exist  in  the  preceding  case  is  here  clearly  reahzed.  There 
is  here  an  act  which  constitutes  a  sharp  distinction  between  the 


INSTITUTION   CASES — IDIOTS  149 

two  subjects,  and  whose  realization  constitutes  a  progress.  We 
may  call  Rich an  idiot  with  incomplete  prehension. 

Then  comes  a  more  intelligent  prehension,  more  spontaneous, 
which  is  provoked  by  visual  perception  of  an  object.  Two  chil- 
dren were  found  belonging  to  this  degree,  and  are  consequently 
idiots  with  complete  prehension. 

Notice  first  the  tests  made  with  Meuh ,  a  child  of  nine 

years,  microcephalic,  cross-eyed,  with  no  control  over  the 
excretions. 

She  turns  her  head  when  a  bell  is  rung  behind  her;  her  eyes  fol- 
low a  lighted  match;  she  stretches  out  her  hand  to  take  an  object  of- 
fered her  J  but  these  movements  are  not  natural.  Her  hand  seems 
to  grope  towards  the  object,  the  other  does  not  aid  it,  prehension 
is  defective;  the  hand  does  not  know  how  to  let  go. 

She  gluttonously  puts  the  whole  piece  of  chocolate  into  her 
mouth  at  once  and  adds  the  wood  as  though  there  were  no  dif- 
ference between  the  two. 

And  that  is  all — no  response  to  our  greeting,  etc. 

Now  see  the  other  idiot. 

Lafre is  eight  or  nine  years  old,  and  seems  more  active  than  the 

preceding  children;  she  walks,  laughs,  kisses,  and  knows  the  persons  whom 
she  sees,  but  she  is  constantly  in  motion,  and  her  attention  is  difficult  to 
fix. 

Here  is  the  result  of  our  examination. 

She  turns  her  head  to  try  to  see  the  bell  that  has  been  rung.  She 
takes  or  rejects  or  throws,  carries  to  her  mouth  or  not,  whatever 
is  presented  to  her  without  examination,  even  without  looking  at 
it,  and  consequently  not  because  it  is  wood,  cork,  sugar  or  choco- 
late but  simply  as  the  notion  takes  her.  Her  attendant  says  she 
will  eat  indiscriminately  pebbles  or  rags.  She  has,  while  being 
examined,  curious  gestures  in  this  respect;  she  often  asks  with  her 
mouth  open  as  another  child  would  hold  out  her  hand.  She  takes 
nothing,  however,  when  numerous  objects  are  presented  to  her  in 
a  box. 

Lafre is  one  of  the  children  who  showed  some  ill-will  in 

submitting  to  the  examination. 

We  do  not  know  whether  or  not  we  should  classify  her  in  this 
inferior  degree  of  inteUigence.  Her  indifference  to  food  might 
come  from  a  defect  of  the  sense  of  taste,  as  well  as  from  a  lack  of 


150  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

the  small  amount  of  intelligence  necessary  to  make  this  distinc- 
tion.    Her  gustatory  sensibility  needs  to  be  investigated. 

^.  Idiot  with  recognition  of  food.  We  have  examined  three  sub- 
jects whom  we  place  in  this  group. 

Pich will  be  ten  in  July.     She  has  an  almost  incessant  twitching  of 

the  eyelids,  and  rhythmic  movements  of  the  arms  as  for  beating  the  tam- 
bourine, which  movements  are  momentarily  suspended  when  her  atten- 
tion is  fixed. 

She  turns  her  head  when  keys  are  shaken  behind  her. 

She  looks  at  a  handkerchief  when  shaken  before  her  eyes. 

If  a  bonbon  is  handed  to  her  she  eats  it;  a  piece  of  money  she 
puts  in  her  mouth;  but  paper  she  shakes,  unfolds  it  a  little  and 
leaves  it  on  the  table.  Does  she  begin  or  not  to  see  what  is  food? 
If  a  piece  of  chocolate  is  given  her  wrapped  in  paper,  she  makes  an 
attempt  to  unfold  it.  She  will  not,  however,  take  anything  unless 
it  is  given  her,  not  even  if  it  is  laid  on  the  table.  She  also  obeys 
the  order  to  come,  given  by  gesture,  and  when  a  metal  box  con- 
taining a  penny  is  shaken  before  her,  she  seems  at  first  a  little 
frightened,  then  takes  the  box  and  shakes  it  herself  after  repeated 
example,  but  it  amuses  her  little  and  she  quickly  leaves  it.  She 
will  not  pick  up  an  object  nor  close  her  eyes  when  ordered. 

This  is  an  instructive  observation  as  is  every  fault  committed. 
The  child  has  not  been  studied  sufficiently.  The  test  which  will 
indicate  her  place  exactly  has  not  been  the  object  of  sufficient  in- 
vestigation. It  would  be  necessary  to  go  over  and  over  until 
there  was  no  longer  any  doubt  as  to  the  reply.  The  child  profits 
in  consequence  from  a  little  indulgence.  It  is,  however,  not  at 
all  doubtful  that  she  shows  a  certain  progress  over  the  preceding 
cases. 

Marc will  be  nine  in  August.  She  has  the  habit  of  frequently  rais- 
ing with  her  index  finger  the  lobules  of  her  ears.  She  walks,  runs,  descends 
stairs  easily,  mounts  them  less  easily;  she  caresses,  rubs  her  head  against 
the  person  who  notices  her  for  a  moment,  or  else  bites  her  own  hand  or 
her  apron  without  its  being  possible  to  recognize  a  motive  for  these  mani- 
festations of  afifection  or  anger. 

She  often  smells  what  is  handed  to  her  before  carrying  it  to  her 
mouth  (this  is  an  illustration  of  the  control  of  one  sense  by  an- 
other), and  permits  less  easily  the  object  to  be  withdrawn  if  it  is 
chocolate. 


INSTITUTION   CASES — ^IDIOTS 


151 


She  takes  spontaneously  from  the  table  some  cakes  which  she 
sees  there.  This  new  extension  of  prehension  seems  to  be  asso- 
ciated with  a  knowledge  of  the  value  of  things,  since  we  here  meet 
it  for  the  first  time.  She  obeys  gestures,  but  imitated  little  and 
seems  indolent;  if  chocolate  is  given  her  wrapped  in  paper  she 
smells  it  and  lets  it  fall;  the  paper  is  then  removed  and  she  is  made 
to  taste  the  chocolate,  after  which  it  is  again  wrapped  before  her 
eyes  and  given  her.  She  does  not  take  off  the  paper  but  gives  it 
back,  as  if  to  ask  that  it  be  given  her  and  hunts  in  the  hands;  she 
seems  interested  and  after  several  demonstrations,  ends  by  open- 
ing the  paper. 

Neither  of  these  children  indicates  any  part  of  the  body  or 
clothing,  or  any  object  named  to  them,  and  does  not  even  look  at 
a  picture. 

These  two  children  have  therefore  knowledge  of  food.  With- 
out doubt  the  difference  between  that  which  can  be  eaten  and 
that  which  cannot  be  eaten  is  still  obscure.  It  seems,  neverthe- 
less, very  certain  that  they  make  the  distinction.  It  can  be  seen 
by  what  slight  stages  one  advances  little  by  little.  We  shall  soon 
see,  on  the  contrary,  the  range  of  knowledge  suddenly  enlarge,  the 
moment  language  appears. 

5.  An  idiot  with  the  power  of  imitation  of  gestures.  We  call  by 
this  name  the  idiot  who  can  say,  "good  day,"  who  understands 
gestures,  imitates  them,  can  reply  to  a  smile,  makes  simple  imi- 


Schematic  Table  of  the  Intellectual  Development  of 

%  Group  of  Idiot  Children 

i 

i 

^ 

A« 

a 

7.  Indicating  and  naming  of  certain  objects  or 

pictures.     Definition  of  objects  by  use 

6.  Indicating  parts  of  the  body 

+ 

+ 
+ 

+ 
+ 

+ 
+ 

+ 
+ 

+ 
+ 

- 

5.  Distinction  between  that  which  is  and  is  not 

food.     Examination,  refusal  to  give  it  back. 

Imitation  of  movements,   and  execution  of 

simple  orders  by  word  or  mimicry 

+ 

4.  Prehension  after  visual  perception 

3.  Prehension  by  tactile  excitation 

2.  Reaction  to  light  and  sound. 

1.  Nothing 

1 

2 

3 

4 

152  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

tations,  and  executes  elementary  orders,  such  as  to  come,  to  sit, 
etc. 

It  is  still  a  question  whether  this  degree  of  idiocy  is  distinct 
from  that  of  the  knowledge  of  food.  Constantly  we  have  found 
the  two  aptitudes  united;  there  is  here  a  point  to  be  decided  and 
new  observations  to  be  made. 

Therefore  up  to  this  point,  there  is  no  manifestation  of  language. 
All  these  children  of  whom  we  have  spoken  are  indeed  idiots. 

We  summarize  in  the  foregoing  table  what  we  have  already  ex- 
plained. It  will  again  be  seen  how  each  child  has  his  place  marked 
in  a  given  group  by  the  fact  that  he  passes  the  test  of  the  preced- 
ing group — while  he  fails  in  those  which  follow. 

IMBECILES 

From  the  moment  language  appears,  the  aid  which  it  brings  to 
the  child  is  enormous.  One  is  now  at  the  level  of  children  of  two 
or  three  years,  perhaps  even  younger,  aged  only  twelve  or  fifteen 
months.  We  will  give  later  more  precise  information.  We  dis- 
tinguish among  imbeciles  the  following  degrees. 

Imbecile  with  faculty  of  naming. 

Imbecile  with  faculty  of  comparison. 

Imbecile  with  faculty  of  repeating  a  sentence. 

It  is  evident  that  these  terms  are  brief  and  need  explanation. 

1,  Imbecile  with  faculty  of  naming 

This  is  one  who  can  reply  to  the  question:  **  What  is  the  name  of 
such  and  such  a  thing?'' 

Here  is  an  example  of  transition  which  seems  to  belong  rather 
to  idiocy. 

Debr epileptic,  ten  years  old,  can  imitate.     Quickly  takes  what 

is  handed  her,  examines  the  object  and  as  soon  as  she  finds  it  is  chocolate, 
kisses  whoever  gave  it  to  her,  and  tries  to  run  away.  She  unwraps  the  choc- 
olate quite  cleverly  from  the  paper. 

When  commanded  she  picks  up,  starts  to  hunt,  but  only  with  a 
relative  docility;  she  does  not  imitate  all  the  simple  movements 
that  one  tries  to  get  her  to  reproduce  by  executing  them  before 
her;  simply  claps  her  hands  but  does  not  close  her  eyes  when 
commanded. 


INSTITUTION   CASES — IMBECILES  153 

She  does  not  show  any  part  of  her  body  nor  of  her  garments 
when  told  to  do  so,  takes  haphazard  any  object  from  among  dif- 
ferent ones  on  the  table  when  asked  to  find  a  certain  one,  gives, 
for  example,  a  cup  when  asked  to  do  so,  but  gives  it  again  when 
asked  for  a  thimble^  even  though  this  is  also  on  the  table  at  her 
disposal,  etc.  Lastly,  she  does  not  look  at  the  pictures  in  an  album 
when  shown,  simply  moistens  her  fingers  and  tries  to  turn  the 
page.  Her  attention  seems  constantly  distracted, .  she  does  not 
remain  in  one  place,  occupies  herself  with  everything  she  sees 
about  her.  In  any  case  she  does  not  seem  to  succeed  in  establish- 
ing the  relation  between  objects  and  their  names.  She  does  not 
therefore  pass  the  fourth  degreer  although  her  response  to  the 
test  is  better  than  the  preceding. 

Now  we  come  to  true  imbeciles  with  the  faculty  of  naming.  We 
do  not  think  it  worth  while  to  make  distinctions,  as  to  whether 
they  name  and  designate  real  objects  and  the  parts  of  their  bodies, 
or,  going  further,  name  and  designate  objects  in  a  picture. 

Gava sixteen  years  old,    microcephalic,    cannot  blow  her  nose, 

drivels  and  has  no  control  of  the  excretions.  She  pronounces  only  inar- 
ticulate cries  except  the  words  ''mamma"  and  "bonbon"  which  can  be 
understood,  but  she  knows  her  caretaker,  a  comrade  whom  she  seems  to 
prefer,  and  is  mostly  affectionate  and  smiling. 

She  successfully  passes  the  first  degree,  executes  commands 
that  refer  to  simple  acts;  throws  a  kiss,  comes  when  she  is  called, 
picks  up  and  gives,  catches  a  ball  which  is  thrown  to  her,  takes  an 
object  to  another  person.  She  imitates  a  Httle,  claps  her  hands, 
crosses  her  arms,  puts  them  to  her  head;  does  not,  however,  close 
her  eyes  when  commanded.  She  shows,  however,  when  asked, 
her  head,  her  ears,  her  nose,  her  apron,  her  shoes  (only  however, 
by  lifting  her  feet),  her  tongue,  her  eyes.  But  she  does  not  pay 
attention,  does  not  even  look  at  the  group  of  objects  from  among 
which  she  is  asked  to  choose  one,  nor  the  pictures  in  which  she  is 
asked  to  designate  such  or  such  a  part;  she  seems  timid  and  with- 
draws her  hand. 

She  is  characterized  by  the  development  of  her  powers  of  imi- 
tation, simple  orders  accompKshed,  and  above  all  the  designation 
of  certain  parts  of  her  body,  that  is  to  say,  the  exact  application 
of  a  certain  number  of  words  heard  to  definite  things. 

Forest is  also  of  the  same  degree.     She  is  a  child  very  slow, 

who  seemingly  has  great  trouble  in  performing  any  movement 


154  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

whatever.  She  only  recognizes  the  thimble  among  the  objects 
shown  but  she  designates  exactly  different  parts  of  her  body  and 
clothing.     She  therefore  belongs  with  the  preceding. 

With  Pige ,  Amy ,  Trompe ,  another  round  of  the 

ladder  is  mounted.     Pige is  nearly  twelve.     She  is  strabismic 

and  has  no  control  of  the  excretions.  She  articulates  badly  but 
has,  nevertheless,  several  words  at  her  command.  She  unwraps 
very  well  a  paper  in  which  some  one  has  enveloped  before  her 
eyes  a  bonbon.  She  imitates  well,  shakes  the  box  with  a  penny 
in  it  and  carries  it  to  her  ear  to  hear  better,  saying  '*  joujou."  She 
claps  her  hands,  puts  her  hands  upon  her  hips,  turns  her  arms, 
dances  and  even  with  a  certain  development  when  once  set  go- 
ing; she  picks  up  objects,  etc.  She  will  hold  her  eyes  shut  for 
quite  a  long  time  but  on  condition  however  that  the  order  is 
frequently  repeated. 

Trompe born   in   November,    1895,    microcephalic   and 

strabismic,  gives  her  name  '^Byseter."  She  recognizes  at  sight 
a  piece  of  wood  offered  her  and  only  hesitates  when  a  brown  piece 
the  color  of  chocolate  is  proffered,  smiles  when  she  sees  it,  takes  it 
and  prepares  to  eat  it,  but  smells  it  and  declares  it  is  a  ''plumeau;" 
when  chocolate  is  given  her  she  takes  it  and  runs  off  crying 
"thanks."  She  resists  and  grows  angry  if  one  tries  to  take  it  from 
her,  and  will  even  steal  it  from  the  table  laughing,  blushing  and 
triumphant  if  she  has  been  able  to  seize  it.  She  picks  up,  imi- 
tates movements,  closes  her  eyes  when  ordered,  but  does  not  keep 
them  closed. 

Amy was  born  in  October,  1890.     She  is  therefore  nearly 

fifteen  years  old.  She  runs  but  does  not  close  her  eyes  at  com- 
mand, puts  her  finger  on  one  of  them,  and  spontaneously  says 
while  pointing  to  it,  ''The  clock,"  which  indicates  at  once  her 
lack  of  attention.  The  other  tests  which  these  children  can  ac- 
complish are  the  following : 

1 .  Indication  of  the  parts  of  the  body.     Pige shows  her  nose, 

her  ear,  her  forehead,  her  hair.    Trompe the  same,  and  in 

addition  her  hands,  her  feet,  her  eyes,  her  thumb.     Amy 

shows  her  hands,  ears,  etc.,  but  her  Httle  finger  instead  of  her 
thumb. 

As  to  the  distinction  between  the  right  and  left  side,  the  difficulty 

seems  to  surpass  by  far  that  of  the  preceding  tests.     Trompe 

repUes  just  as  it  happens,  sometimes  one,  sometimes  the  other. 
Amy is  equally  unrehable. 


INSTITUTION   CASES — IMBECILES  155 

2.  Indication  and  naming  of  objects.     Pige shows  without 

error  cup,  button,  cork,  candle  and  ribbon.     Names  a  watch 

"tic-tac,"  a  chapeau,  ''po,"  ruler,  ''ru."     Thompe names 

the  same  objects  by  other  inventions  of  his  own. 

Amy often  designates  haphazard,  she  gives  for  example  no 

matter  what  when  one  asks  for  a  cup,  a  little  flask  for  a  box  of 
matches,  a  nail  for  a  crayon,  nevertheless  she  knows  this,  also  the 
bell,  the  thimble,  the  ribbon.  Notice  also  that  she  often  points 
out  an  object — 'Hhere!"  before  anyone  has  asked  her  anything;  so 
if  anyone  asks  her  to  show  the  ''nitchevo"  she  will  point  out  with- 
out hesitation,  a  bottle,  and  for  the  ''patapoum,"  the  cup. 

She  names  the  thimble,  button,Hhread,  does  not  name  a  piece 
of  chalk  and  finally  names  a  feather  ''plumier"  (duster),  a  neck- 
lace ''a  pearl"  and  gives  ''machin"  for  a  whistle  and  a  nail. 

S.  Indicating  parts  of  a  picture  which  are  named.     Pige 

points  out  certain  things,  the  ''dada,"  ''mama,"  the  doll,  but  she 
goes  fast,  often  points  out  haphazard,  the  duster  for  the  broom, 
the  coffee-pot  for  the  plates,  etc.  Finally  when  we  say  to  her, 
''show  the  mama"  she  designates  another  object;  and  the  table, 
she  touches  the  table  where  we  are  working. 

Trompe points  out  the  table,  the  mama,  the  cat,  the  big 

sister,  the  doll,  the  football,  etc.  Her  manner  of  proceeding  is 
singular  enough.  She  sticks  the  finger  rapidly  upon  an  object 
before  the  question  has  been  entirely  formulated.  Sometimes 
however  she  hunts,  for  example,  the  boquet,  and  ends  by  discov- 
ering it  or  else  she  makes  a  mistake.  She  may  show  the  duster 
for  the  broom,  the  soup  bowl  for  the  coffee-mill.  "Where  is  the 
patapoum?"  she  laughs  and  shows  the  broom;  the  "nitchevo?" 
she  points  out  anything  no  matter  what,  but  always  points  out 
something. 

Amy shows  the  table,  the  big  sister,  after  having  first 

designated  her  for  the  mama,  the  bouquet  after  a  like  error  but 
she  knows  the  window,  and  shows  the  stool  for  the  broom,  etc., 
then  she  tries  to  turn  the  page;  she  has  but  little  power  of 
attention. 

4.  Naming  of  objects  in  a  picture.    Pige names  in  a  picture, 

a  horse,  bird,  dog,  girl  (names  are  all  more  or  less  deformed). 
She  imitates  more  or  less  well,  the  cries  of  a  cat,  dog,  little  bird, 
but  not  of  a  sheep.  But  when  asked  what  the  gentleman,  hold- 
ing a  cane,  has  in  his  hand  she  replies  ''he  holds  a  cake."    Amy 


156  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

names  the  "lady,"  etc.  She  knows  the  use  of  objects  a  little.  A 
pencil,  for  example  is  "to  write." 

However  primitive  may  be  these  tests  which  we  have  just  passed 
in  review,  they  are  nevertheless  the  first  experiments  properly  so 
called.  This  is  an  important  fact.  It  even  shows,  on  the  part  of 
the  subject  who  submits  to  them,  a  faculty  of  adaptation  already 
quite  developed.  In  the  previous  cases  where  it  was  a  question 
only  of  prehension  and  imitation,  we  have  scarcely  been  able  to 
do  more  than  choose  from  among  the  habitual  conditions  of  their 
ordinary  life  those  conditions  from  which  we  could  draw  the  con- 
clusions which  we  sought,  and  to  which  we  were  reduced  from 
lack  of  method.  Now,  on  the  contrary,  we  begin  to  obtain  from 
the  child  a  certain  sort  of  response  made  with  the  direct  inten- 
tion of  replying. 

The  examples  which  we  have  given  permit  other  remarks.  We 
sometimes  ask  the  child  where  in  the  picture  such  and  such  imagi- 
nary objects  are  to  be  found.  And  always  something  was  shown 
us.  This  is  the  result  of  an  extreme  suggestibility.  But  why? 
The  explanation  is  to  be  found  in  the  habit  so  common  among  them 
of  replying  at  random,  and  also  in  their  evident  satisfaction  in  any 
kind  of  a  reply.  It  is  as  though  the  quality  of  fitness  escapes  them. 
Without  doubt  they  learn  from  experience  but  without  grasping 
its  whole  significance.  Therefore  they  are  always  proud  of  the 
result  whatever  it  be.  We  have  not  found  a  single  one  who  re- 
plies, "I  do  not  know." 

We  may  also  note  that  if  several  objects  are  recognized  and 
named,  nevertheless  the  language  is  often  defective;  the  word  em- 
ployed is  a  childish  one  and  not  the  proper  term;  moreover  there 
is  scarcely  an  unfamiliar  object  which  does  not  represent  an 
insurmountable  difficulty.  The  vocabulary  thus  shows  itself  to 
be  extremely  limited. 

2.  Imbecile  with  faculty  of  comparison}^  This  is  one  who  can 
compare  two  lines  or  two  weights;  who  can  also  repeat  three  fig- 
ures, but  can  go  no  further. 

We  found  five   children   belonging  to   this  class:  Ruz , 

Temple ,  Bouth ,  Bona ,  Delai. 

Ruz  —  said  "Good  day."  Her  replies  are  lively.  She  can  give  some 
information  about  her  family  but  very  childish.     Her  sister  is  named  Nini. 


^5  We  believe,  without  being  certain,  that  there  exists  an  intermediate 
degree,  that  of  imbeciles  with  faculty  of  comprehension. 


INSTITUTION   CASES — IMBECILES  157 

What  does  your  father  do?     "He  works— =At  what?     "He  sews."     And 

your  mother?     "She walks."     Temple born  in  1894  has  been  in  the 

institution  since  1897.  She  says  "Good  day,"  gives  her  name  and  can  also 
give  the  name  and  address  of  her  parents.  She  is  serious,  attentive  and 
docile;  for  example,  she  held  her  eyes  closed  for  If  minutes  even  though 

without  warning  a  bell  was  rung  behind  her  ear.     South born  the  14th 

of  September,  1897,  says  "Good  day,"  gives  her  name,  but  says  indiffer- 
ently she  is  twenty  or  twelve  years,  old,  but  her  replies  are  slow  and  her 

language  indistinct.     Bona is  a  child  of  twelve,   somewhat  sleepy 

and  slow;  she  is  beginning  to  read.     Delai is  ten  years  old. 

We  shall  pass  rapidly  over  the  tests,  already  accomplished  by 
the  preceding  children  and  consequently  easy  for  these.  Tem- 
ple   ,  Ruz ,  Bouth ,  show  correctly  the  different  parts 

of  the  body,  but  Temple  alone  seems  to  distinguish  her  right  from 
her  left  hand;  the  others  do  not  seem  to  attribute  any  sense  to 
these  words,  because  they  sometimes  show  both  sides  at  once 
when  asked  for  one  or  the  other. 

Naming  of  objects  seems  equally  easy  with  the  eyes  closed,  the 
objects  consequently  being  identified  only  by  feeling.     Without 

doubt  Bouth knows  neither  a  cork  nor  a  candle,  Ruz by 

feeling  mistook  a  paint  brush  for  a  pencil.  Temple  however 
gave  proof  of  more  knowledge,  and  knows  ''safety-pin",  ''two 
sous."  If  one  objects  to  this  last  reply  by  saying  that  only  one 
is  there,  she  persists  in  her  opinion  saying,  "that  makes  two 
sous — one  big  one."     It  is  not  difficult  however,  to  bring  out  a 

certain  curious  confusion  of  words  "  code  "  for  "  cord  " — (Ruz ) 

"soufflet"  (box  on  the  ear)  for  "sifflet"  (whistle).  Le  Temple  in 
pointing  out  the  freckles  on  her  cheeks,  called  them  "t aches  de 
doucer^'  (sweetness)  for  "taches  de  rousseur^'  (brown,  the  French 
expression  for  freckles). 

Definitions  by  use  are  here  still  very  poor,  matches  are  to  ''Hght 
the  candle";  a  cork,  "to  place  near  a  bottle" — a  nail,  "to  hang 
things  on." 

In  the  picture,  the  advertisement,  the  sky  and  the  lamp- 
lighter, puzzle  her  still;  the  advertisement  is  ''a  book,  a  copy  book;" 
the  sky  is  "water"  and  as  for  the  lamp-lighter  "he  goes  up  the 
ladder"  or  "makes  smoke,"  or  finally  "lights  a  candle." 

The  mental  inferiority  revealed  by  the  repHes  to  "patapoum" 
and  "  nitchevo  "  is  a  little  less.  Ruz does  not  hesitate  to  indi- 
cate at  random.     Bouth shows  something  for  the  first,  but 

hunts  vainly  for  the  second  with  her  finger.  Temple  says  at  first, 
"I  do  not  know"  but  shows  a  stool,  and  replies  for  the  other — 


158  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

"Le  Nit  —  I  do  not  see  it."  In  spite  of  all  defects,  one  feels 
at  every  step  an  advance  over  the  children  of  preceding  groups. 

There  are  two  tests,  characteristic  of  the  group,  which  show 
the  difference  more  clearly.  One  of  them  consists  in  indicating 
the  longer  of  two  unequal  lines,  the  other  the  immediate  repeti- 
tion of  three  figures  that  have  been  repeated  to  the  child. 

The  children  of  the  preceding  group  could  not  pass  the  test 

of   comparison   of   lines.     Pige always   showed   both   lines 

when  it  was  necessary  to  point  out  the  longer,  the  one  on  the 

left.    Trompe pointed  to  the  one  on  the  right  and  with  the 

remainder  of  the  lines  was  often  wrong.    Amy showed  them 

both.     On  the  contrary  Temple generally  replied  without 

hesitation,  with  an  approving  nod  of  her  head  after  each  designa- 
tion, and  made  no  mistake  even  when  asked  several  times.     Bona 

,  Delai recognized  at  once  the  longer  lines,  Ruz , 

Bouth the  same.     When  there  was  a  catch,  none  of  the 

children  noticed  it.    Bouth the  first,  had  nevertheless  quite 

a  long  period  of  hesitation.  But  there  is  in  the  question  such  a 
strong  suggestion  that  it  dominated  all  appreciation. 

The  differences  of  length  between  the  lines  varied  greatly, 
sometimes  being  strikingly  apparent  and  again  scarcely  per- 
ceptible. We  had  thought  a  priori  that  that  which  seemed  diffi- 
cult to  us  would  be  impossible  for  these  children.  The  result 
obtained  was  contrary  to  all  expectation.  From  the  moment 
they  could  do  the  test,  they  did  it  perfectly,  showing  a  correctness 
of  glance  that  was  surprising.  To  speak  correctly,  their  inferi- 
ority was  not  due  to  less  sensorial  acuteness  but  to  less  intellectual 
acuteness;  without  doubt  it  is  the  act  of  comparing,  a  very  special 
function  of  the  mind,  which  differentiates  the  preceding  group 
from  this  special  group  of  children. 

Amy could   scarcely  repeat   two   figures.     Ruz gets 

three,  but  with  difficulty. 


FiaUBES  GIVEN 

FIGUKES  REPEATED 

2,  8,  7 

7 

3,6,5 

7 

1,  2,  9 

1 

6,  1,  4 

6,  1,4 

2,  7,  3 

7,3 

4,  0,  2,  8 

4,  0 

6,  1,  4,  7 

no  reply 

INSTITUTION   CASES — IMBECILES 


159 


Here  is  the  test  of  Bouth ,  showing  that  she  succeeded 

four  times. 


FIGUKES 

GIVEN 

riGURES   HEPEATED 

2,8, 

7 

2, 

8, 

7 

3,6, 

5 

3, 

5 

1,2, 

9 

1, 

2, 

9 

6,1, 

4 

6, 

1, 

4 

2,7, 

3 

2, 

7, 

3 

4,0, 

2, 

8 

4. 

0, 

8 

6,1, 

4, 

7 

1, 

2, 

4,5 

3,2, 

9, 

5 

3, 

2, 

5  ...  8 

6,4, 

4, 

9 

6, 

9, 

4 

Bounam always  succeeded,  and  Le  Temple can  re- 
peat as  many  as  four  figures: 


FIGUBES   GIVEN 

FIGUEE8   REPEATED 

3,2,8 
4,5,9 
6,  2,  1,  8 
1,  0,  9,  7 

3,2,8 
5.4,  9 
2,  3,  4,  5,  8 
1,  0,  9,  7 

Several  inversions  were  noted  besides  a  tendency  to  give  the 
numbers  in  their  natural  order  1,  2,  4,  5  (Bouth),  2,  3,  4,  5,  (Le 
Temple).  This  characteristic  tendency  of  intellectual  weakness, 
is  better  brought  out  when  six  figures  are  to  be  repeated.  Thus  it 
often  happens  that  a  subject  gives  the  whole  series  of  figures 
from  one  to  ten.  This  is  very  rare  among  young  normals,  al- 
though examples  can  be  found. 

Let  us  examine  Delai born  February  28,  1895. 

Asked  to  pick  a  particular  one  from  a  group  of  objects,  she 
takes  one  at  random.  She  indicates  exactly  the  longer  of  two 
lines  of  unequal  length.  She  succeeds  at  the  second  trial  in 
repeating  three  figures: 

O,    i&,   O,  O,    o 

6,1,4,  5,1,4 

She  cannot  repeat  a  single  sentence  nor  indicate  the  difference 
between  two  objects.  One  sees  at  once  her  place.  Her  intel- 
lectual level  is  the  same  as  the  preceding.  The  simple  enumer- 
ation of  her  replies  suffices  to  satisfy  us  as  to  this. 


160  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

3.  Imbeciles  with  ability  to  repeat  sentences.  The  repetition 
of  simple  sentences  was  not  possible  among  the  children  of  the 
preceding  group.  This  test  was  a  barrier  for  them;  it  presented 
a  difficulty  which  they  could  not  overcome.     This  incapacity 

presents  all  degrees.     Ruz could  not  repeat  even  a  part  of 

any  sentence  that  was  given  her.  Bouth ,  Delai re- 
peated only  isolated  words.     Bouth asked  to  repeat,    ^'I 

get  up  in  the  morning,  I  dine  at  noon  and  I  go  to  bed  at  night," 
said,  "1  bed and  bed breakfast,  etc. " 

Q.  In  the  summer  the  weather  is  fine,  in  the  winter  snow  falls. 
A.  Summer.     .     .     .     and     ....    winter. 

Delaigne.  Q.  I  get  up,  etc.  A,  I  get  up  at  night  and  I  go 
to  bed. 

Q.  In  summer,  etc.    A.  Summer    ....    it  falls. 

Q.  Germaine,  etc.    A.  Germaine  has  been  ba     .     .     .     . 

Among  four  sentences  given  to  her,  Bonamy  only  once  for- 
mulated a  sentence  more  or  less  correct:  ''I  get  up  in  the  morning 
I  go  to  bed  at  night     ....     and  at  noon,  one  eats.'' 

Le  Temple Among  six  sentences  given  there  were  two 

very  much  abbreviated  to  be  sure  but  which  nevertheless  made 
sense.  In  summer  it  is  fine.  In  winter  it  rains.  Germaine  has 
been  bad  —  scolded.  Twice  on  the  contrary  she  only  muttered 
words  almost  without  connection.  Once  she  avowed  her  in- 
ability "I  don't  know  how  to  say  that." 

Thus  none  of  them  was  successful.  On  the  contrary,  here  are 
new  subjects  who  succeeded:  Vaubr twelve  years,  micro- 
cephalic with  slight  goitre,  who  knows  her  age  but  not  her  date 

of    birth.     Tilma thirteen    years.     Vasie a    victim    of 

mjrxoedemia,  twenty  years,  always  smiling,  executed  very  well 
the  repetition  of  simple  sentences. 

Here  are  the  individual  replies  to  this  test.     Vaubr "I 

get  up,  etc.  .  .  ."  no  reply,  even  partial. — "In  summer, 
etc "     Repetition  entirely  correct. 

Tilma "  I  get  up,  etc.,  no  reply,  even  partial.     '^  In  summer, 

etc."     Repetition  entirely  correct. 

Vasie ,  ''I  get  up     .     .     .     .     etc.",   ''I    dine   at   noon, 

I  go  to  bed  at  night,  I  breakfast  in  the  morning,"  "In  summer, 
etc."     Repetition  correct. 

It  can  thus  be  seen  that  among  the  children  who  cannot  suc- 
ceed in  this  test,  several  of  them  pronounce  only  incoherent, 


INSTITUTION   CASES — ^MORONS 


161 


words.  It  would  not  do  to  attribute  to  this  incoherence  alone 
a  prejudicial  value  because  it  is  sometimes  found  among  normals 
— although  much  younger  it  is  true. 

There  remain  the  children  who  repeat  correctly  the  sentences 
and  who  therefore  belong  to  the  group  we  are  studying  at  this 
time.  It  is  interesting  to  observe  that  this  test  which  marks 
the  culmination  of  their  faculties,  is  readily  passed  by  normal 
children  of  five  years.  But  the  youngest  of  this  group  is  twelve, 
and  the  oldest  twenty  years  of  age. 

Schematic  Table  of  the  Intellectual  Development  of  a  Group  of  Imbecile 

Children 


14.  Answers  to  abstract  sen- 
tences   

13.  Rhymes 

12.  Placing  5  weights  in  order , . 

11.  Concrete  differences 

10.  Repetition  of  simple  sen- 
tences   

9.  Comparison  of  lines 

8.  Repetition  of  3  figures 

7.  Indicating  and  naming  of 
certain  objects  or  pictures 
6.  Indicating    parts    of    the 

body 

5.    Distinction  between  what 
is  food  and  what  is  not. . . 
Imitation  and  execution  of 
simple  orders 


+ 


+ 


MORONS  (d:6biles) 


Our  third  group  is  composed  of  children  who  succeed  with 
tests  more  difficult  than  the  preceding. 

A  differentiating  sign  is  lacking  for  this  group.  Language 
distinguishes  the  idiot  from  the  imbecile;  it  seems  that  our  next 


162  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

tests  should  require  more  intellectual  initiative  than  the  pre- 
ceding ones,  should  presuppose  more  invention,  or  a  judgment 
in  which  ideas  play  a  preponderant  role.  But  in  reality  we  do 
not  know  whether  it  is  a  question  of  a  compHcation  of  elementary 
processes,  or  whether  new  faculties  are  required.  Five  tests,  as 
for  the  preceding  groups,  will  suffice  to  establish  subdivisions 
which  though  of  less  importance  at  least  will  facilitate  the  ex- 
position.   We  shall  pass  them  successively  in  review. 

Morons  with  faculty  of  reasoned  comparison.  The  first  advance 
seems  to  be  realized  by  the  possibility  of  recognizing  and  stating 

the  difference  between  two  given  things.     Etel ,  eighteen 

years  old,  is  the  representative  type  of  the  group.  Her  repHes 
were  correct  for  the  lines;  she  had  no  difiiculty  in  repeating 
three  figures;  the  repetition  of  simple  sentences  produced  indeed 
one  error,  but  she  was  correct  in  her  other  attempt.  Finally  this 
child  distinguished  herself  clearly  over  the  preceding  when  she 
was  asked  to  indicate  the  difference  between  two  things. 

Bon ,  Van ,Till ,  Vas ,  children  of  the  pre- 
ceding groups,  either  did  not  reply  or  simply  repeated  the  words 
of  the  question,  "cardboard,"  " paper, '^  "Ay/'  etc.  or  defined 
more  or  less  one  of  two  things,  "A  fly  can  fly — the  cardboard — 
one  cuts  things,"  etc.,  but  did  not  indicate  a  single  difference. 
These  are  similar  to  the  replies  of  normal  children  who  do  not 
comprehend,  but  who  nevertheless  wish  to  satisfy  the  questioner, 
but  they  are  the  replies  of  very  much  younger  normal  children. 
In  contrast  to  these  are  the  replies  of  Etel . 

Q.  What  difference  is  there  between  paper  and  cardboard? 

A.  The  paper  is  finer  and  the  cardboard  harder. 

Q.  The  difference  between  a  butterfly  and  fly? 

A.  A  butterfly  is  much  larger  than  a  fly. 

Q.  The  difference  between  glass  and  wood? 

A.  Glass  is  thicker. 

Certainly  the  last  reply  is  not  brilliant,  but  the  whole  forces 
us  to  recognize  that  the  consciousness  of  difference  is  not  foreign 
to  this  child,  since  she  makes  several  correct  applications. 

Morons  with  the  faculty  of  seriation.  The  arranging  in  order  of 
five  weights  of  the  same  volume,  requires  a  prolonged  effort,  a 
series  of  operations  performed  in  a  determined  direction,  the 
conception  of  an  end  to  be  attained,  and  the  means  of  arriving 
there.    The  child  is  given  over  to  his  own  powers;  he  must  hold 


INSTITUTION   CASES — ^MORONS  163 

in  his  mind  what  is  to  be  done,  and  this  directing  idea  which  has 
been  given  him  must  serve  to  coordinate  his  different  acts.  Three 
children  examined,  succeeded.     But  here  it  is  interesting  first  to 

see  how  those  of  the  imbecile  group  fail.     Til for  instance 

when  asked  to  arrange  the  five  weights  in  order  beginning  with  the 
lightest,  contents  herself  by  placing  them  side  by  side;  when  urged 
to  weigh  them,  she  takes  three  in  one  hand,  two  in  the  other, 
balances  them  a  little  as  if  to  judge  better,  then  places  them  at 

random.     Etel whom  we  have  placed  among  the  morons, 

aheady  seemed  to  handle  them  more  skillfully,  but  the  idea  of  a 
serial  order  escaped  her.     Notice  on  the  contrary  the  following : 

Liss is  full  of  life,  her  acts  seem  more  intelligent,  she  makes 

only  one  mistake.  Here  is  the  order  which  she  found  15,  12,  9,  3, 
6.     She  is  a  child  of  seventeen. 

Lebos (sixteen  years)  exclaims  on  seeing  them,  "Oh  yes, 

they  are  all  the  same,"  but  having  weighed  them  in  her  hand, 
arranges  them  correctly. 

Janss (sixteen  years)  does  the  same  in  spite  of  her  timidity. 

The  same  children  were  able  to  give  reasoned  comparisons,  and 
do  successfully  all  that  precedes.  The  test  of  weights  then  seems 
indeed  a  new  degree. 

Other  tests.  To  comprehend  what  a  rhyme  is  seems  more  sub- 
tle than  arranging  weights.     Lebos ,  Janss ,  after  the 

explanation  thought  that  houton  and  mouton  did  not  rhyme,  and 

Lisse ,  who  seemed  to  understand  better,   could  only  find 

"obeissant"  and  "obeir"  to  rhyme  with  "  ob^issance. "     On  the 

other  hand  Gouven (fourteen  years)  gave  in  one  minute  the 

following  rhymes;  "souciance"  ''negligence"  ''intelligence," 
"elegance,"  But  we  add  that  this  child  had  obtained  her  certi- 
ficate (certificat  d'etudes).  We  are  approaching  more  and  more 
the  normal.  What  is  the  degree  which  separates  us  from  the 
normal?     Principally  abstract  questions. 

No  child  of  the  preceding  group  to  whom  we  gave  the  abstract 
questions  was  able  to  reply  correctly  if  the  sentence  was  a  Uttle 
compHcated.     Etel finished  haphazard. 

Q.  When  one  has  need  of  good  advice? 
A.  You  must  take  care  of  yourself. 

Lisse is  scarcely  more  capable. 

Q.  If  one  has  offended  you  and  comes  to  beg  your  pardon? 
A.  "One  listens."     She  answers  simply. 


164  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

Jansee ,  before  giving  your   opinion,  etc.    A.  One  must 

hunt  for  it. 

Lebos at  least  says  squarely;  "I  do  not  know/'  but  with 

a  tone  of  bad  humor,  as  though  vexed  to  be  found  in  complete 
ignorance. 

Without  doubt  the  foregoing  answers  are  not  wholly  devoid 
of  sense,  one  could  even  find  a  certain  cleverness  about  some  of 
them.  But  then  almost  any  reply  might  be  forced  to  make 
sense — it  is  a  matter  of  interpretation.  But  it  is  evident  that  the 
child  is  incapable  of  the  subtlety  which  one  would  suspect  if  his 
words  came  from  someone  else. 

Gouv sometimes  succeeds. 

Q.  When  one  has  need  of  good  advice?  • 

A.  One  must  ask  one's  superiors. 

Q.  Instead  of  crying  over  an  accident  that  has  happened? 

A.  One  must  try  to  avoid  it. 

She  too  has  misunderstood  the  situation. 

We  have,  however,  two  children  who  surpass  this  .     Romer 

and  Ferrous .    Here  are  the  repHes  of  Romer: 

Q.  Before  giving  advice,  etc.? 

A.  One  must  reflect. 

Q.  When  someone  has  offended  you  and  comes  to  ask  your  pardon? 

A.  One  must  forgive  him. 

This  child  has  already  passed  the  other  test,  having  found 
rhymes.  The  reply  to  this  abstract  question  places  her  at  once 
in  a  higher  group. 

The  ideas  of  Ferrous are  still  more  active,  as  is  shown 

by  her  replies  to  abstract  questions: 

Q.  When  anyone  asks  your  opinion  of  a  person  of  whom  you  know  little? 
A,  Faith,  I  hardly  know  what  I  would  say.     I  would  say  that  I  did  not 
know  his  character. 

Q.  Instead  of  crying,  etc.? 
A.  One  repairs  it  if  possible. 

In  conclusion  she  was  the  only  child  who  put  three  words  in  a 
sentence:  '1  was  in  Faris  and  I  saw  a  gutter;  I  gained  a  fortune.'' 

Here  are  two  children  who  may  rank  with  normal  children  of 
twelve  years.  They  themselves  are  seventeen.  It  would  be 
necessary  to  give  other  tests  in  order  to  compare  them  with  nor- 


INSTITUTION   CASES — ^MORONS 


165 


mal  children  of  their  own  age.     They  are  therefore  above  the 
series. 

Table  of  the  Intellectual  Development  of  a  Group  of  Morons 


17.  Abstract  differences 

16.  Cutting  out 

15.  Sentence  with  three  words 

14.  Answering  abstract  questions. 

13.  Rhymes 

12.  Arranging  five  weights 

11.  Concrete  differences 

10.  Repetition  of  simple  sentences 

9.  Repetition  of  three  figures. . . . 

8.  Comparison  of  lines 


In  order  to  characterize  the  morons  they  must  be  separated 
both  from  imbeciles  and  normals.  The  boundary  on  the  side  of 
imbecihty,  we  have  already  indicated.  That  on  the  side  of 
normahty,  seems  to  us  to  consist  especially  in  the  ability  to 
answer  abstract  questions;  but  it  must  be  understood  that  that 
limit  is  especially  devised  for  children  of  school  age,  not  over 
fourteen  for  instance;  this  test  would  be  insufficient  to  distinguish 
morons  of  twenty  years  and  over  from  normals. 

In  concluding  with  these  children  of  Dr.  Voisin^s  institution, 
we  note  that  it  would  almost  always  be  possible  to  compare 
them  with  normal  children  very  much  younger.  We  have  often 
been  struck  with  the  resemblance  which  exists,  and  which  can 
be  called  out  in  the  reactions  of  normals  and  subnormals  of  a 
different  age.  It  is  possible  that  certain  differences  are  hidden 
under  these  resemblances,  and  that  some  day  we  shall  succeed 
in  differentiating  them  so  clearly  that  we  shall  be  able  to  find 
signs  of  psychological  retardation,  altogether  independent  of  age. 
Evidently  it  would  be  of  great  value  to  know  these  signs.  But 
for  the  moment,  that  which  especially  strikes  us  is  the  resemblance 
between  young  normals,  and  subnormals  very  much  older.  These 
resemblances  are  so  numerous,  and  so  striking  that  truly,  one 
could  not  tell  by  reading  the  reactions  of  a  child  whose  age  is 


166 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 


not  given,  whether  he  were  normal  or  subnormal.  Furthermore 
it  is  easy  to  point  out  that  certain  clever  remarks  of  precocious 
children,  if  they  came  from  adults  would  stamp  the  latter  as 
morons. 

In  conclusion,  it  seems  to  us  that  if  our  divisions  and  tests  are 
adopted,  the  rank  and  intellectual  development  of  each  subject 
can  be  fixed  with  great  precision. 

Here  is  one,  for  example,  whom  according  to  our  classification 
we  consider  an  idiot.  It  would  be  impossible  for  him  to  be 
designated  by  M.  Magnan  a  moron  and  by  M.  Bourneville  an 
imbecile,  if  they  took  our  divisions  for  a  guide,  because  we  dis- 
cover that  the  subject  does  not  recognize  nor  name  the  different 
parts  of  his  body.  If  one  adds  ''idiot  with  prehension,"  one 
distinguishes  him  at  the  same  time  from  the  idiot  who  has  only 
visual  coordination  and  the  one  that  knows  food,  which  gives  a 
distinct  idea  of  his  aptitudes.  There  would  be  no  uncertainties 
or  contradictions  of  nomenclature. 

Let  us  again  recall  our  classification: 


Idiocy 
(Incapacity  for  naming,  or 
recognizing  familiar  ob- 
jects when  named,  or 
parts  of  the  body,  or  ob- 
jects in  a  picture.  Apti- 
tudes of  normal  children 
from  0  to  2  years.) 


Vegetative  idiot.  No  trace  of  ideas  of  rela- 
tionships. 

Idiot  with  visual  coordination.     Follows  with 

his  eyes  a  moving  object  (lighted  match). 

TJi-  *      '41.     [Takes  an  object  that  touches 
Idiot  with  ,  .    ,       , 

p    ,        .      -^      his  hand. 

[Takes  an  object  that  he  sees. 

Idiot  who  knows  food.  Can  distinguish  be- 
tween what  is  and  what  is  not  food. 

Idiot  who  can  imitate  simple  gestures.  Un- 
derstands gestures,  mimics,  imitates  and 
obeys. 


Imbecility 
(Capability  for  verbal  nam- 
ing. Incapacity  of  finding 
the  difference  between 
known  objects.  Aptitude 
of  normal  children  from 
2  to  5  years). 


Imbeciles  with  faculty  of  naming.  Names 
and  recognizes  the  principal  parts  of  his 
body,  familiar  objects,  pictures. 

Imbeciles  with  faculty  of  comparison.  Com- 
pares two  weights  of  3  and  15  grams,  two 
lines  of  5  and  8  centimeters. 

Imbeciles  with  faculty  of  repetition.  Repeats 
an  easy  sentence  of  15  words. 


The  study  of  moronity  will  be  better  made  in  the  schools. 


SUBNORMALS   OF   THE   PRIMARY   SCHOOLS  167 

III.  Subnormals  of  the  Primary  Schools 

In  the  institution  we  have  studied  the  idiot  and  the  imbecile; 
the  subnormals  that  we  shall  study  in  the  primary  schools  are 
the  morons. 

Let  it  be  well  understood  in  the  beginning  that  we  do  not  pro- 
pose a  general  method  of  diagnosis  for  all  morons,  whatever  their 
age.  This  would  be  beyond  our  pretensions.  We  have  studied 
only  the  morons  of  from  eight  to  thirteen  years,  such  as  one  finds 
in  the  schools.     It  is  to  these  alone  that  our  process  applies. 

At  the  time  when  we  write  these  lines,  every  primary  school 
in  France  has  repUed  to  a  questionnaire  sent  out  by  the  Minis- 
terial Commission  on  subnormals  in  which  each  school  was  asked . 
to  give  the  number  of  deaf  mutes,  blind,  of  medically  subnormals, 
of  the  backward  and  the  unstable.^^  These  lists,  filled  out  by  the 
teachers,  were  collected  at  the  Bureau  of  Public  Instruction  in 
Paris,  and  were  placed  at  the  disposal  of  the  ministerial  conomis- 
sion,  of  which  one  of  us  (Binet)  was  a  member.  It  would  there- 
fore be  easy  for  us  to  know  exactly  how  many  subnormals  could 
be  found  in  the  schools  of  Paris,  and  thanks  to  the  kindly  authori- 
zation of  M.  Bedorez,  and  his  predecessor  M.  Carriot,  who  opened 
wide  for  us  all  the  schools  of  the  city  of  Paris,  we  could  apply 
our  method  to  the  diagnosis  of  many  hundreds  of  subjects. 

We  are  still  ignorant  whether  the  Ministerial  Commission, 
intends  to  proceed  to  a  scientific  examination  in  the  primary 
schools — of  course  by  the  delegation  of  its  power  to  certain  of 

^*  These  distinctions  have  an  administrative  value,  but  very  little  if 
any,  scientific  value.  We  do  not  know  what  the  medical  subnormal  means, 
which  is  here  distinguished  from  the  backward  and  the  "unstable."  It  is 
probable  that  by  medical  subnormal  we  must  understand  idiot,  and  by  the 
others  we  must  understand  imbeciles  and  morons.  One  of  us  (Binet)  was 
able  to  take  note,  with  the  Minister  of  Public  Instruction,  of  the  an- 
swers made  by  the  provinces  to  the  ministerial  questionnaire.  The  fig- 
ures shown  are  lower  than  it  was  supposed;  sometimes,  indeed  too  low.  to 
be  exact.  Certain  Departments  indicate  as  unstable  only  two  or  three 
subjects.  The  average  figures  for  21  Departments,  would  be  64  backward 
boys,  and  38  girls;  78.3  unstables  for  boys,  and  45.2  for  girls,  or  a  total  of 
123.5  for  each  Department,  and  a  total  a  little  over  10,000  for  all  France, 
exclusive  of  Paris.  Very  likely  the  figures  for  Paris  will  be  higher  than 
these,  which  show  but  2  backward  for  1000,  a  proportion  that  pleases  lis 
but  leaves  us  skeptical.  The  total  number  of  subnormals  who  are  at  pres- 
ent in  the  primary  public  schools  of  Paris  would  be  about  3000. 


168  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

its  members — in  order  to  discover  the  truly  subnormal  children, 
and  submit  them  to  tests  that  would  indicate  their  subnormal 
character.  They  would  have  very  many  motives  for  making 
this  investigation:  (1).  The  motive  of  control  over  the  statistics 
which  they  are  going  to  arrange.  It  would  be  well  to  know  ex- 
actly in  a  certain  proportion  of  the  schools,  how  far  the  scientific 
diagnosis  would  accord  with  the  judgment  of  the  teachers;  (2) 
An  educational  motive  for  the  teachers;  to  show  them  in  this  way 
if  they  deceive  themselves,  where  they  have  committed  errors, 
and  what  are  the  criteria  which  they  should  henceforth  employ 
in  order  to  be  more  exact;  (3)  An  educational  motive  for  future 
inspectors  who  will  be  charged  with  the  examination  of  subnormals, 
and  who  will  have  to  decide  upon  their  admission  to  the  special 
classes. 

An  examination  of  the  subnormal  children  in  the  schools,  should 
on  general  principles  be  made  without  the  aid  of  the  teachers. 
These  might  take  during  the  examination  different  attitudes 
that  would  be  somewhat  disconcerting.  Without  doubt  the 
majority  of  them  are  too  enlightened  to  misunderstand  not 
only  the  scientific  but  the  social  interest  of  these  questions,  and 
one  has  the  right  to  expect  from  them  much  zeal  and  readiness 
to  give  to  the  investigators  all  useful  information  at  their  dis- 
posal. But  certain  ones  of  them  will  commit — and  have  already 
committed  as  we  have  proved — errors  of  many  kinds. 

Certain  ones  are  absolutely  hostile  to  an  investigation  of  sub- 
normals. These  are  the  timid  ones  who  fear  to  have  trouble  with 
the  parents,  behind  whose  discontent  they  always  fear  to  see  the 
shadow  of  a  municipal  oflScer  or  a  newspaper  reporter.  There 
are  also  the  proud  who  feel  that  to  admit  having  a  subnormal 
would  prove  their  pedagogical  incompetence.  There  are  also 
those  gentle  philosophers  who  imagine  that  the  ideal  school  is 
the  one  where  one  never  raises  the  voice,  and  which  functions  in 
the  perfect  stillness  of  routine.  There  are  also  the  skeptics  who 
are  tired  of  waiting  for  a  reform  in  the  matter  of  subnormals  and 
who  no  longer  believe  reform  possible.  Such  minds  will  reply 
to  the  investigators  what  they  have  already  replied  to  the  ques- 
tionnaire: ''We  have  no  subnormals!"  or  again,  ''We  do  not 
know  how  to  recognize  them;  that  belongs  to  the  doctors.'' 

Others  would  be  lead  by  an  exaggerated  zeal  to  make  errors  in 
the  opposite  direction.     Some  have  already  stated  that  they  have 


SUBNORMALS    OF   THE   PRIMARY   SCHOOLS  169 

50  subnormals  in  a  school  of  300.  They  seem  to  reason  in  the 
following  way:  "Here  is  an  excellent  opportunity  for  getting  rid 
of  all  the  children  who  trouble  us,"  and  without  the  true  critical 
spirit,  they  designate  all  who  are  unruly,  or  disinterested  in  the 
school. 

For  these  and  many  other  reasons,  it  is  better  that  the  investi- 
gator prepare  himself  to  dispense  with  the  help  of  the  director, 
or  at  least  that  he  be  sufficiently  sure  of  his  method  of  procedure, 
to  control  and,  when  necessary  to  put  to  the  test  the  information 
received  from  the  director.  The  practical  question  which  presents 
itself  does  not  lack  elegance  in  its  simplicity;  here  it  is:  being 
given  any  school,  whose  population  numbers  from  100  to  800 
pupils,  visit  the  classes  and  discover  the  subnormals  scattered 
among  them.  Must  we  examine  one  by  one  all  the  pupils  in  a 
school?  No,  certainly  not!  That  would  be  altogether  useless. 
One  should  consider  as  suspicious  only  those  children,  who  are 
the  oldest  in  their  class,  but  whose  marks  are  almost  constantly 
the  lowest.  One  should  ask  the  ages  of  the  children  by  a  col- 
lective appeal;  then  one  should  look  at  their  reports.  We  our- 
selves have  not  had  the  opportunity  of  making  this  summary 
selection;  but  it  certainly  would  be  easy  and  rapid.  Suppose  that 
it  is  made.  It  remains  to  proceed  to  an  individual  examination 
of  only  a  small  number  of  children. 

It  is  this  individual  examination  which  we  are  now  preparing 
and  hope  to  make  easy  by  setting  forth  the  investigations  that 
we  have  already  undertaken.  We  write  the  following  lines  with 
the  conscious  intention  of  rendering  a  service  to  future  examining 
commissions  who  will  have  to  pronounce  upon  the  scholastic 
fate  of  subnormals. 

We  voluntarily  forego  the  help  which  the  pedagogical  and 
medical  method  may  furnish,  when  those  methods  are  completely 
organized.  We  shall  content  ourselves  with  employing  exclus- 
ively the  psychological  method.  We  have  used  it  ourselves  in 
several  schools  of  Paris  to  recognize  subnormals,  and  it  seems 
to  have  given  us  the  beginnings  of  vital  results.  We  first  went 
to  those  schools  whose  directors  are  among  the  most  intelligent 
and  the  most  competent.  Among  these  we  note  M.  Vaney,  the 
author  of  a  work  published  in  this  volume,  upon  the  measure  of 
the  instruction  in  arithmetic.  M.  Vaney  is  particularly  interested 
in  the  question  of  subnormals  and  we  had  every  reason  to  believe 
a  priori  that  the  selection  of  subnormals  which  he  made  in  his 


170  DEVELOPMEN*T   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

school  would  be  excellent.  We,  however,  were  eager  to  examine 
those  whom  he  had  chosen.  We  did  examine  them,  begging  him 
at  the  same  time  to  mingle  them  with  normals  so  that  their 
identity  would  not  be  known  to  us.  This  ignorance  is  the  indis- 
pensable condition  of  any  just  examination.  It  is  really  too  easy 
to  discover  signs  of  backwardness  in  an  individual  when  one  is 
forewarned.  This  would  be  to  operate  as  the  graphologists  did 
who,  when  Dreyfus  was  believed  to  be  guilty,  discovered  in  hia 
handwriting  signs  of  a  traitor  or  a  spy.  Saganarelle  also,  in 
le  Medecin  malgre  lui  found  the  pulse  of  the  man  bad  whom  he 
thought  to  be  sick.  The  doctor  in  an  institution  to  whom  the 
parents  bring  a  supposedly  defective  child,  does  not  need  to  show 
very  much  critical  sense,  because  as  a  matter  of  fact  under  such 
conditions  he  never  sends  any  child  back,  nor  declares  it  to  be 
normal.  A  little  irony  is  the  most  salutary  thing  in  the  world 
in  a  case  like  this,  and  we  disdain  the  opinion  of  those  whom  it 
could  hurt. 

We  have  pursued  our  inquiries  in  other  schools  where  there  was 
a  difference  of  opinion  between  the  director  and  the  teacher  who 
had  the  child  in  her  class;  the  director  judged  the  child  normal, 
the  teacher  judged  it  subnormal;  sometimes  there  was  a  difference 
of  opinion  between  the  actual  teacher  and  the  teacher  of  the 
previous  year.  Such  cases  generally  are  difficult  to  decide  upon, 
because  the  defect  is  slight  and  the  retardation  is  not  very  evident; 
or  it  may  be  that  it  is  a  question  of  a  child  whose  disposition  is 
difficult;  that  is  to  say  an  unstable  rather  than  a  retarded  child. 
The  process  which  we  recommend  consists  in  applying  to  the 
child,  without  any  preconceived  idea,  all  of  the  tests  and  com- 
paring the  results  with  those  obtained  from  normals,  without 
regard  to  his  age.  Since  we  possess  a  nearly  complete  series  of  the 
results  of  the  tests  for  each  age  of  normal  children,  it  is  easy  to 
find  the  place  of  the  candidate  in  such  a  series.  The  subsequent 
consideration  of  his  age  permits  us  then  to  know  if  he  is  backward, 
and  how  much  below  the  average;  and  one  establishes  also,  at 
the  same  time,  in  what  faculties  the  retardation  is  most  marked. 
This  is  the  complete  method;  it  is  minute  and  naturally  takes 
some  time,  possibly  a  half  hour.  Under  other  circumstances 
one  can  resort  to  a  more  rapid  method,  which  consists  in  starting 
the  child  on  the  tests  appropriate  for  his  age;  if  he  fails,  his  re- 
tardation is,  in  a  way,  instantly  manifest.  This  investigation 
takes  only  five  minutes. 


SUBNOKMALS    OF   THE   PRIMARY  ^SCHOOLS  171 

We  indicate  this  to  show  how  rapid  the  psychological  method 
may  be;  but  we  disapprove  of  this  rapidity.  The  matter  is  too 
serious  to  the  child  for  us  to  wish  to  economize  a  few  minutes  of 
his  time.  On  the  contrary  if  the  examination  should  last  an 
hour,  for  instance,  but  given  at  different  times,  we  should  not 
think  it  too  long — quite  the  contrary. 

When  our  series,  a  portion  of  which  we  have  given  in  this 
article,  is  completed,  when  instead  of  resting  upon  the  exami- 
nation of  only  10  or  15  subjects,  it  rests  upon  100,  we  shall  proceed 
by  comparing  the  supposed  subnormal  with  the  average  normal 
of  each  age,  and  we  shall  thus  see  to  what  average  age  he  cor- 
responds for  each  kind  of  test.  This  method  is  certainly  the  best 
and  the  most  sure,  because  the  average  value  represents  the  most 
fixed  value,  the  ideal  value.  Unfortunately  our  data  are  still 
far  from  numerous,  and  we  do  not  possess  averages  for  each  age, 
but  only  meager  averages  distributed  over  two  years.  Thus, 
provisionally,  we  shall  make  use  of  the  results  given,  not  only 
by  the  average  normal,  but  by  the  most  mediocre  normal  child. 
The  latter,  for  different  reasons,  is  often  an  exceptional  type. 
It  must  be  understood  that  if  we  use  this  as  a  standard,  it  is  in  a 
wholly  provisional  manner,  in  order  to  offset  the  insufficiency  of 
our  data. 

FIRST   OBSERVATION 

Here  is  a  child  of  twelve  years,  Martin,  who  presents  himself 
to  us  without  our  knowing  to  what  class  he  belongs.  He  is  sent 
to  us  without  other  information  than  his  age.  During  our  ex- 
amination we  willingly  deprive  ourselves  of  all  the  indications, 
often  very  valuable,  which  the  pedagogical  method  could  furnish. 
We  do  not  ask  him  to  read  or  write  and  when  he  leaves  us  we  do 
not  even  know  if  he  can  do  so.  In  the  same  way  we  systematically 
neglect  the  information,  always  somewhat  indirect  but  sometimes 
significant,  of  the  medical  method.  Martin  has  a  small  head, 
narrow  brow,  and  ears  like  handles.  It  is  probable  that  the 
careful  measurements  of  his  cephalic  development  would  indicate 
some  stigmata.^^    Since  he  is  past  twelve  years  old  it  would  be 

^^  Let  us  note  here  a  few  interesting  results  which  we  gathered  when  the 
psychological  test  was  finished.  By  the  development  of  his  head,  and  by 
his  height,  Martin  is  subnormal;  his  height  is  1.27  m.,  and  the  volume  of 
his  head  is  that  of  a  2  year  old  child. 


\ 


172  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

proper  to  commence  his  examination,  if  one  wished  to  be  rapid, 
by  the  series  of  abstract  questions.  But  we  prefer  to  take  the 
longer  route  and  to  study  the  child  in  a  more  complete  fashion. 

Let  us  begin  by  reasoned  comparisons.  Here  are  Martin's 
replies. 

Differences:  (1)  The  wood  is  larger  and  the  glass  is  thinner. 

(2)  The  butterfly  is  larger  and  the  fly  is  smaller. 

(3)  The  cardboard  is  thicker  and  the  paper  is  thinner. 
Strictly  speaking,  with  a  good  deal  of  indulgence  one  could 

allow  these  replies  to  pass,  although  we  must  note  two  defects; 
first  the  repetition  of  the  same  point  of  view,  that  of  size,  which 
by  indolence  or  mental  limitation  is  applied  to  three  comparisons; 
and  lastly  an  absurdity  committed  in  comparison  of  wood  and 
glass.  We  have  observed  a  normal  child  of  nine  years,  who 
twice  repeated  the  same  point  of  view,  but  committed  no  ab- 
surdity. Nevertheless  Martin  is  twelve  years  old.  He  is  there- 
fore by  that  simple  experiment  placed  below  children  of  nine 
years. 

Although  we  have  not  published  at  any  length  comparisons  of 
resemblances,  we  give  those  of  Martin.     They  are  very  poor. 

(1)  The  poppy  is  smaller  than  blood. 

(2)  The  label  is  smaller,  the  picture  is  square,  the  newspaper 
is  long. 

Q.  But  no.    You  must  tell  me  how  these  things  are  alike! 
A.  They  are  not  alike. 

(3)  Fly,  flea,  butterfly.  They  are  alike  in  the  head.  The 
flea,  it  has  the  head  of  a  fly. 

All  these  remarks  of  our  subject  give  a  first  impression.  Martin 
shows  himself  at  least  capable  of  making  reasoned  comparisons; 
he  makes  them  more  or  less  well,  but  he  does  make  them;  there- 
fore he  is  superior  to  children  of  five  years;  and  further  if  the 
criterion  is  adopted  which  we  have  already  indicated,  and  which 
consists  in  distinguishing  imbecility  from  moronity  by  the  test 
of  reasoned  comparisons,  he  is  not  an  imbecile.  But  is  he  a 
moron?  A  methodical  examination  will  answer  for  us.  Let  us 
study  separately  his  memory,  his  sensorial  intelligence,  and  his 
abstract  intelligence. 

Memory.  Martin  is  a  child  who  has  a  sufficiently  good  memory 
to  be  normal.  Twice  at  ten  days  interval,  he  repeated  for  us  8 
sentences.     Each  time  he  repeated  exactly  and  rapidly  the  first 


SUBNORMALS   OF   THE   PRIMARY   SCHOOLS  173 

three,  the  easiest.  At  the  first  examination  he  repeated  very- 
well  the  8th  sentence,  failed  in  the  others  and  committed  an 
absurdity  for  the  5th.  ''One  must  not  say  all  that  one  thinks, 
but  one  must     ....     (hesitation)  say  all  that  one  thinks." 

At  the  second  examination  the  5th  sentence  is  repeated  ex- 
actly but  trouble  occurs  in  the  8th  sentence.  ''The  horse  draws 
the  carriage,  the  wheel  is  heavy  and  the  carriage  is  low."  This 
is  not  very  intelligible. 

To  summarize,  at  each  one  of  the  examinations  Martin  succeeds 
in  repeating  four  sentences  and  he  commits  an  absurdity.  Cer- 
tain normals  of  eleven  years  have  done  no  better.  So  it  is  not 
through  lack  of  memory  that  l\e  is  subnormal.  There  exists, 
however,  a  distinctive  characteristic  in  the  manner  of  his  repeti- 
tion, speed.  If  anything  stops  him,  and  prevents  him  from  re- 
peating immediately,  he  is  lost,  and  can  no  longer  give  a  word 
of  what  has  been  said  to  him.  This  proves  that  he  uses  only  the 
memory  of  sound  in  repeating  sentences,  not  the  memory  of 
ideas.     This  latter  would  be  more  lasting. . 

The  memory  of  pictures  is  more  than  good,  it  is  really  excellent. 
He  succeeds  in  retaining  8  out  of  13  pictures;  he  belongs  to  the 
average  level  of  children  of  eleven  years,  is  even  a  little  in  advance 
of  them.  This  is  worthy  of  note  because  we  shall  see  that  on  the 
whole  Martin  is  certainly  a  moron.  It  is  therefore  important  to 
remark  that  for  one  psychological  test  a  moron  may  make  fewer 
mistakes  than  certain  normals.  We  believe  that  this  fact  is  of 
great  pedagogical  importance.^^ 

His  memory  for  figures  has  two  characteristics:  in  appearance 
it  is  normal,  because  he  succeeds  in  repeating  exactly,  a  series  of 
5  figures,  as  do  certain  children  of  eleven  years;  he  is  therefore 
from  this  point  of  view  almost  normal,  slightly  inferior,  however, 
because  the  normal  repeats  6.  But  it  is  characteristic  of  him 
that  he  judges  very  poorly  the  corrections  of  his  reproductions. 
We  require  him  to  say,  "That  is  right"  when  the  repetition 
has  been  correct,  and  "That  is  not  right"  when  it  has  been  in- 
correct. In  the  first  place — a  fact  that  is  important — ^he  does 
not  submit  to  this  convention,  and  he  must  be  reminded  of  it 
about  8  times  before  he  begins  to  give  the  signal  spontaneously- 

18  Let  us  say  right  here  that  Martin  is  not  an  exception  to  the  rule  con 
cerning  the  morons ;  all  the  morons  have  a  visual  memory  as  good  as  the 
normals  of  their  age. 


174  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

and  again  he  often  fails.  These  lapses  prove  to  us  the  difficulty 
he  has  in  learning.  In  the  second  place  we  learn  that  he  is  truly 
an  optimist.  He  believes  that  he  has  correctly  replied  in  many 
cases  where  he  has  deceived  himself.  Six  times  he  declares 
"That  is  right,"  when  he  was  wrong  and  only  4  times  did  he 
admit  he  was  wrong,  and  in  3  of  these  he  had  said  nothing  at  all. 
These  are  indeed  characteristic  errors,  where  the  absence  of 
attention  borders  closely  on  absence  of  judgment.  Such  curious 
cases  require  careful  study.  We  suppose  that  by  a  strong  appeal 
to  the  attention,  by  long  training  one  might  succeed  in  arousing 
this  lagging  judgment.  But  that  would  no  longer  be  an  exami- 
nation, it  would  be  education. 

Let  us  note  again  with  Martin,  many  inventions  of  figures  and 
sometimes,  though  rarely,  a  tendency  to  follow  the  natural  order 
in  the  invention.  Thus  one  gives  him  the  series  5,  1,4,  8,  2,  7, 
and  he  announces  the  series  5,  1,  2,  3,  7. 

It  can  thus  be  seen  that  in  this  test  so  far  as  it  goes  the 
memory  is  sufficient.  It  is  not  through  absence  of  memory  but 
through  weakness  of  judgment  that  Martin  fails.  These  exam- 
ples show  how  necessary  it  is  to  carefully  analyse  results.  A 
hasty  examination  would  have  recognized  in  Martin  a  reasonable 
memory,  nothing  more. 

Sensorial  intelligence.  Martin  conducts  himself  here  in  a  very 
interesting  manner,  which  needs  close  examination.  Let  us 
begin  by  the  comparison  of  lines.  This  test  is  of  the  desired 
simplicity.  We  have  the  intention  of  grasping,  if  possible,  an 
elementary  fact  of  sensation;  but  from  the  moment  of  making 
this  experiment  we  demand  also  something  of  the  judgment. 
An  attentive  study  of  Martin  will  show  the  part  intelligence 
plays  in  the  affair.  Although  that  part  is  hidden,  Martin  reveals 
it  to  us;  because  the  little  slips  which  he  makes  are  errors  of 
judgment  and  all  the  more  curious  since  his  sensorial  faculties 
seem  good  and,  to  be  just,  normal. 

Bending  over  the  little  lines  he  makes  but  a  single  error.  That 
is  excellent,  and  that  error  is  without  doubt  due  to  a  moment  of 
distraction.  He  is  therefore  at  the  level  of  children  of  eleven 
years,  only  a  little  trait  in  his  manner  of  proceeding  is  worth 
notice.  He  shows  himself  eager  to  designate  something  and 
begins  by  pointing  out  haphazard  any  one  at  all.  Then  he  cor- 
rects himself  quickly,  spontaneously,  in  a  way  to  show  that  his 
glance  is  true,  in  a  word,  normal. 


SUBNOKMALS   OF  THE   PRIMAKY   SCHOOLS  175 

For  the  long  lines  he  shows  the  same  surety  of  glance.  He 
makes  only  four  errors,  for  the  lines  6,  8,  10,  11.  Children  of 
eleven  years  make  on  an  average  from  3  to  5  mistakes,  and  some 
make  6  and  even  7.  He  is  therefore  normal.  More  than  this, 
starting  with  the  6th  line,  when  he  begins  to  make  mistakes,  he 
is  seized  by  automatism  and  indicates  five  times  in  succession  the 
line  to  the  right.  We  rarely  find  with  children  eleven  years  old 
an  equally  prolonged  automatism.  And  even,  on  taking  up  the 
test  at  another  time,  we  obtain  from  Martin  a  complete  series  of 
twelve  automatic  replies,  that  is  to  say  twelve  times  in  succession 
he  indicates  the  line  on  the  right.  This  is  truly  a  sign  of  weak- 
ness of  intellect.  No  normal  child  of  eleven  years  so  far  as  we 
know  has  conducted  himself  in  this  way. 

Putting  in  order  five  weights — another  test  of  sensorial  intelli- 
gence— contains  also  some  perceptions,  but  it  implies  that  the 
weights  are  arranged,  and  that  consequently  the  perceptions 
are  directed  and  grouped  under  the  influence  of  a  judgment 
of  the  whole.  Here  again,  and  perhaps  in  a  still  more  characteris- 
tic manner,  Martin  furnishes  for  us  a  distinction  between  senso- 
rial perception  and  judgment.  Considering  only  the  errors  which 
he  commits,  this  test  definitely  shows  his  mental  inferiority.  See 
his  manner  of  arranging: 

9    3    6    12    15] 
15    9    3      6    12  [  24  errors 
15    9    3      6    12j 

This  total  of  24  errors  is  not  made  by  any  child  of  eleven  years, 
nor  of  nine  years  nor  of  seven  although  certain  ones  of  the  latter 
group  approach  this.  Martin  would  therefore  be  below  a  child 
of  seven  years.  And  interpreting  his  error  it  is  certain  that  it 
is  not  through  inattention,  or  through  fault  of  our  explanation, 
for  at  different  times  we  went  over  our  explanation  of  what  was 
necessary.  Furthermore,  Martin  is  satisfied  with  his  results, 
he  thinks  them  correct,  and  manifests  his  satisfaction  with  that 
naivete  of  amour  propre  which  characterizes  morons. 

We  considered  it  wise  to  have  him  continue  his  arrangements, 
in  order  to  see  if  through  repetition  he  would  manifest  any  prog- 
ress. There  has  been  none.  Here  are  his  successive  arrange- 
ments. 


176  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 


15 

3 

6 

9 

12 

15 

12 

3 

9 

6 

14  errors 

15 

9 

12 

6 

3. 

15 

3 

12 

6 

9 

15 

6 

9 

12 

3 

14  errors 

15 

3 

12 

6 

9 

Martin  uses  only  one  hand,  the  right.  He  scarcely  compares 
the  two  weights.  He  seems  only  to  hunt  for  one,  the  heaviest. 
In  fact,  the  box  of  15  grams  is  now  always  correctly  placed. 
This  is  curious  enough.  The  errors  with  the  other  boxes  are 
erratic  enough,  but  an  error  with  15  is  never  committed.  It  is 
even  with  great  cleverness  that  Martin  discovers  this  box  of 
15  grams.  He  goes  at  it  with  the  surety  of  instinct.  In  order  to 
prevent  him  from  recognizing  the  boxes  by  sight  we  have  envel- 
oped all  in  paper  which  makes  them  exactly  similar.  With  the 
boxes  wrapped  in  paper,  Martin  has  made  the  following  arrange- 
ments : 

15      9      6    12      3] 

15    12      6      9      3  [  12  errors 

15      6      9      3    I2J 

12      6    15      3      9] 

15      6    12      9      3  [  18  errors 

15      9      3      6    I2J 

No  progress  has  been  made  and  the  box  numbered  15  remains 
in  correct  position.  There  is  nevertheless  with  Martin  a  very 
good  sensorial  function,  since  he  succeeds  in  recognizing  the 
heaviest  of  5  weights  but  this  judgment  does  not  permit  him  to 
imderstand  the  order  of  the  other  four.  This  is  precisely  the 
type  of  error  made  by  children  seven  years  old,  and  it  is  interesting 
to  see  that  mental  state  retained  by  a  child  of  eleven  years.  It  is  a 
striking  proof  of  the  fact  that  the  sensorial  faculty  may  be  good 
but  the  judgment  poor.  Let  us  finish  by  the  test  of  paper  cutting, 
the  last  of  those  upon  sensorial  intelligence.  He  draws  an  angle, 
not  closed,  small  and  not  in  the  center  of  the  paper;  he  is  there- 
fore very  inferior  to  children  of  eleven  years. 

Abstract  intelligence  and  language.  His  inferiority  to  children 
of  his  own  age  is  pronounced  in  these  respects.  He  fails  in  the 
rhjrmes;  he  gives  the  following  words  as  rhyming  with  ob^issance; 
ob^i,  ob^issante,  sage,  dissip6.  After  a  minute  we  renew  the 
explanation  which  has  no  other  result  than  to  make  him  pro- 


SUBNORMALS    OF   THE   PRIMARY   SCHOOLS  177 

nounce  the  word,  "obei."  Scarcely  any  child  of  nine  years 
would  commit  a  similar  absurdity. 

But  it  is  chiefly  in  the  series  of  abstract  questions  that  his 
deficiency  shows  itself.  This  series  alone  would  be  sufficient  to 
characterize  him,  and  so  definitely  that  other  tests  seem  super- 
fluous. We  shall  now  give  the  exact  replies,  generally  very 
brief,  and  we  shall  follow  them  with  our  marks  as  for  normal 
children. 

There  are  no  less  than  8  absurdities,  3  silences  and  4  replies 
marked  3  or  4. 

By  the  number  of  these  absurdities  he  is  very  much  inferior  to 
the  worst  children  of  nine  and  eleven  years.  There  were  only 
two  children  of  seven  years  who  committed  a  number  of  absurdi- 
ties approaching  his,  that  is  to  say  seven. 

1.  Go  to  bed,  1. 

2.  Cover  up  well,  1. 

3.  One  must  hurry,  1. 

4.  Put  on  a  raincoat,  1. 

5.  Go  on  foot,  3. 

6.  One  must  wait,  2. 

7.  One  must  pay,  2. 

8.  One  must  tell  the  teacher,  1. 

9.  Get  the  firemen,  1. 

10.  Silence. 

11.  Listen,  3. 

12.  One  does  not  know,  2. 

13.  To  pay  the  rent,  1. 

14.  Silence. 

15.  Must  not  go,  4. 

16.  One  must  work,  2. 

17.  One  must  not  listen,  A. 

18.  One  must  do  nothing,  A. 

19.  A  fight,  3. 

20.  Nothing,  A. 

21.  Because  he  has  done  harm,  A. 

22.  Because  he  is  worse  and  then  he  is  not  so  bad,  A. 

23.  Because  he  wishes  to  quit,  A. 

24.  Because  it  was  a  good  thing,  A. 

25.  One  does  not  do  it,  A. 

To  recapitulate,  Martin  is  a  child  whose  sensorial  faculties  and 
memory  for  immediate  repetition  are  normal;  but  even  in  the  most 
elementary  experiments  slight  details  already  betray  his  lack 
of  judgment.     He  lacks  judgment  first  in  certain  tests  of  sensorial 


178  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

intelligence  (like  arranging  weights)  and  especially  in  verbal 
tests  implying  abstract  ideas.  For  all  these  points  he  has  scarcely 
the  level  of  children  of  seven  years  so  that  he  is  retarded  five 
years,  since  he  is  twelve  years  old.  This  case  is  interesting  be- 
cause of  the  evidence  of  mental  inferiority.  In  the  school,  one 
meets  with  morons,  but  they  are  seldom  of  as  profound  a  charac- 
ter as  Martin.  He  represents  one  of  the  lowest  grades  above  im- 
becility.13 

We  shall  now  study  more  rapidly  a  second  type  of  mental 
inferiority  much  more  frequent  than  the  preceding. 

SECOND   OBSERVATION 

Raynaud  is  a  young  boy  of  eleven  years  with  fine  regular  fea- 
tures. He  has  nothing  subnormal  in  his  physique  nor  in  his 
manners.  The  impression  which  he  makes  is  much  more  favor- 
able than  that  of  Martin.  Nevertheless  when  examined  closely, 
one  finds  he  has  a  rather  weak  cephalic  development.  His  head 
is  the  size  of  that  of  a  child  of  5  years,  a  retardation  of  six  years, 
which  without  being  unknown  among  normals,  is  nevertheless  rare. 
We  did  not  take  the  measurement,  be  it  well  understood,  until 
after  the  psychological  examination  was  ended.  His  height  is 
normal,  1.4  meters. 

During  the  examination  there  is  a  marked  contrast  of  manner 
with  that  of  Martin.  In  proportion  as  Martin  is  quick,  Rajoiaud 
is  slow.  He  can  scarcely  make  up  his  mind  to  reply;  he  is  un- 
decided, pained  almost,  and  contracts  his  brows  as  if  in  distress. 

The  test  of  reasoned  comparisons  is  favorable. 

He  gives  concrete  differences. 

The  paper  is  light,  and  the  cardboard  is  heavy. 

The  fly  is  smaller. 

Wood  is  less  heavy  than  lead. 

He  is  therefore  not  an  imbecile. 

We  shall  not  give  in  detail  all  the  tests— that  would  be  tedious 
and  useless.    We  give  a  summary. 

Memory,  Raynaud  is  weak,  weaker  than  Martin,  although 
superior  in  judgment,  as  will  hereafter  appear.  He  correctly 
repeats  only  three  out  of  8  sentences,  which  is  few.  His  memory 
is  therefore  defective,  although  not  below  some  normals  of  eleven 

^»  According  to  M.  Vaney,  this  subject  is  4  grades  backward  in  figures. 
It  is  only  in  the  last  year  that  he  has  been  able  to  read  well. 


SUBNORMALS    OF   THE   PRIMARY   SCHOOLS  170 

years.  Moreover  his  trouble  comes  from  his  slowness  in  replying. 
So  also  for  numbers,  he  does  not  exceed  four;  on  the  whole  he  does 
not  go  so  far  as  Martin,  nor  as  normals  of  his  age;  on" the  other 
hand  he  never  deceives  himself,  or  very  seldom,  and  at  once 
corrects  the  error  that  he  commits.  Thus  he  has  a  poor  memory, 
this  is  one  of  his  weak  points.  This  is  probably  a  particular 
form  of  memory,  the  slow  form  as  though  benumbed. 

Sensorial  intelligence.  He  succeeds  very  well  in  all  the  tests 
and  commits  only  one  error  with  the  short  lines  and  only  two  for 
the  long.  He  is  therefore  in  this  respect  superior  to  normals  of 
his  age.  ■ 

For  the  arrangement  of  weights,  he  makes  no  mistake,  uses 
both  hands,  weighs  with  care,  five  times  in  succession  he  makes 
not  a  single  error. 

For  the  paper  cutting  he  draws  a  central  diamond. 

Here  is  a  child  who  in  spite  of  his  moronity,  as  we  shall  observe 
in  an  instant,  has  a  good,  an  excellent  sensorial  intelligence.  With- 
out doubt  it  is  this  which  should  be  cultivated  in  him  rather  than 
yoking  him  to  abstract  notions. 

Abstract  intelligence.  Several  preliminary  tests  show  his 
weakness;  he  cannot  find  a  single  rhyme,  and  he  cannot  make  a 
synthesis  of  three  words  in  a  sentence.  But  it  is  chiefly  in  his 
manner  of  replying  to  abstract  sentences  that  he  reveals  himself. 
He  has  6  absurd  replies,  5  silences  and  only  4  replies  marked  3 
or  better.  This  places  him  on  a  level  with  children  of  seven  years 
and  he  is  but  slightly  superior  to  Martin. 

Here  then  is  the  opinion  which  one  must  form  of  this  pupil. 
He  is  a  moron;  and  represents  a  type  which  we  believe  quite 
common,  the  moron  with  sensorial  intelligence.  One  frequently 
encounters  this  combination.  The  sensorial  intelligence  of  Ray- 
naud is  better  than  that  of  Martin,  and  the  proof  is  the  skill 
with  which  he  arranges  the  weights,  and  draws  the  cut  in  the 
paper.  If  Martin  is  low  grade  moron  type,  Raynaud  represents 
a  type  of  intellect  a  little  higher. 

Let  us  recall  as  a  particular  trait  of  Raynaud,  his  indolence  of 
memory. 

It  seems  to  us  that  intelligent  pedagogy  could  gain  much  from 
these  facts.2° 

20  M,  Vaney  says  that  Raynaud  is  retarded.  This  child  has  been  in 
school  for  5  years;  he  is  only  in  the  second  grade  in  arithmetic.  He  was 
not  able  to  read  until  9|  years  old. 


180  DEVELOPMENT  OF  INTELLIGENCE 

THIRD   OBSERVATION 

A  few  words  will  suffice  to  characterize  young  Ernest.  The 
director  of  the  school  and  the  child's  teacher  do  not  agree  in  re- 
gard to  him.  The  teacher  thinks  he  understands,  and  believes 
him  to  be  normal.  The  director  insists  that  he  has  only  attained 
the  third  grade  in  arithmetic  in  spite  of  his  5  years  in  school,  and 
that  he  had  difficulty  in  learning  to  read;  therefore  he  is  disposed 
to  consider  him  retarded.     Who  is  right? 

Assuredly  the  director.  It  is  not  out  of  respect  for  those  in 
authority  that  we  agree  with  him,  it  is  because  the  psychological 
method  proves  it. 

The  error  of  the  teacher  comes  no  doubt  from  the  fact  that  he 
compares  him  with  very  much  younger  pupils,  aged  from  seven 
to  nine  years,  who  are  in  the  same  class,  and  does  not  take  into 
account  the  dilBference  in  age;  this  is  one  of  the  reasons  why 
teachers  so  often  give  defective  reports  of  their  pupils. 

One  might  also  make  allowance  for  this  child  because  he  suffers 
from  a  malady  which  occasions  absence  from  school,  but  the 
psychological  examination  removes  all  doubt.  Ernest  is  mediocre 
but  not  below  normal  for  the  memory  of  sentences  (3  sentences 
repeated,  and  2  absurdities)  and  for  the  memory  of  figures  (4 
figures  only;  here  is  evident  retardation,  but  not  lack  of  judgment). 
His  memory  is  weak. 

Sensorial  intelligence  is  normal;  6  errors  for  the  long  lines, 2, 7,8,, 
10,  11,  and  none  for  the  short;  he  arranges  the  weights  3  times 
without  error  and  completes  the  gaps  with  one  error  in  three 
attempts.     He  draws  a  central  diamond. 

So  far  Ernest  would  be  normal  but  abstract  intelligence  is 
deficient  in  him  as  in  Raynaud  and  most  other  defectives.  He 
is  in  the  same  class  as  Raynaud  only  slightly  less  marked.  For 
abstract  questions  he  has  5  absurdities,  1  silence,  and  10  replies 
marked  3  or  better.  This  is  a  little  better  than  Raynaud  gave 
us.  But  one  sees  at  the  same  time  that  this  is  the  level  of  children 
of  seven  years;  and  moreover  normal  children  of  seven  years  are 
more  prudent;  when  they  do  not  understand,  they  keep  silence 
and  here  is  truly  a  condition  where  silence  is  golden. 

These  three  little  psychological  biographies  show  clearly  what 
is  most  lacking  in  morons.  It  is  abstract  intelligence.  In  a 
rapid  examination  one  might  be  satisfied  to  give  them  7  or  8  of 


SUBNORMALS   OF   THE   PRIMARY  SCHOOLS  181 

these  abstract   questions.     They  would  serve  immediately  to 
classify  them. 

We  may  be  excused  from  developing  here  a  long  conclusion. 
One  word  will  suffice.  We  have  only  wished  to  prove  that  it  is 
possible  to  find  in  a  precise  and  truly  scientific  way,  the  level  of 
intelligence,  to  compare  that  level  with  a  normal  level,  and  con- 
sequently to  conclude  how  many  years  a  child  is  retarded.  In 
spite  of  the  inevitable  errors  of  an  initial  work,  which  is  mere 
groping,  we  believe  we  have  made  our  demonstration. 

A.  BiNET  AND  Th.  Simon. 


THE  DEVELOPMENT  OF  INTELLIGENCE  IN  THE  CHILD 

UAnnee  Psychologique  1908 

"The  Measurement  of  Intelligence"  is,  perhaps,  the  most  oft 
repeated  expression  in  psychology  during  these  last  few  years. 
Some  psychologists  affirm  that  intelligence  can  be  measured; 
others  declare  that  it  is  impossible  to  measure  intelligence.  But 
there  are  still  others,^  better  informed,  who  ignore  these  theoretical 
discussions  and  apply  themselves  to  the  actual  solving  of  the 
problem.  The  readers  of  VAnnee^  know  that  for  some  time  we 
have  been  trying  approximations,  but  they  were  not  so  well  thought 
out  as  are  those  which  we  now  present. 

We  have  constantly  kept  in  mind  the  point  of  view  of  pedagogy, 
normal  as  well  as  pathological.  For  several  years  we  have  tried 
to  gather  all  the  data  and  material  capable  of  shedding  light  upon 
the  intellectual  and  moral  character  of  children.  This  is  by  no 
means  the  minor  part  of  pedagogy,  the  least  important,  nor  the 
least  difficult.  We  set  for  ourselves  the  following  program:  first, 
to  determine  the  law  of  the  intellectual  development  of  children 
and  to  devise  a  method  of  measuring  their  intelligence;  and, 
second,  to  study  the  diversity  of  their  intellectual  aptitudes. 

We  hope  that  we  shall  be  able  to  keep  faithfully  to  this  rather 
-extensive  program,  and  especially  that  we  shall  have  the  time  and 
the  strength  to  realize  it,  but  already  we  see  that  the  subject  is 
far  richer  than  we  at  first  imagined.  Our  minds  always  tend  to 
simplify  nature.     It  had  seemed  to  us  sufiicient  to  learn  how  to 

^  We  have  sometimes  been  accused  of  being  opposed  with  blind  infatua- 
tion, to  all  theory  and  to  the  a  priori  method.  It  is  an  unjust  reproach. 
We  admit  the  use  of  theory  before  the  experimental  researches,  in  order 
to  prepare  them  and  afterwards  to  interpret  them;  what  we  strongly  re- 
ject, are  theoretical  discussions  which  are  either  intended  to  take  the  place 
of  an  exploration  of  facts  or  which  are  established  upon  obscure,  equivocal 
and  legendary  facts,  such  as  are  gathered  from  books,  for  this  is  what  cer- 
tain people  call  observing;  it  is  reading.  In  our  opinions,  the  ideal  of  the 
scientific  method  must  be  a  combination  of  theory  and  of  experimenta- 
tion. Such  a  combination  is  well  defined  in  the  following  formula:  pro- 
longed meditation  upon  facts  gathered  at  first  hand. 

*  See  Annee,  XI,  p.  163  and  fif. 

182 


THE  MEASUKEMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE  183 

measure  the  child's  intelligence.  This  method  of  measurement 
we  now  set  forth,  which  if  not  complete  is  at  least  established 
upon  correct  lines,  and  already  usable.  But  our  experience  has 
taught  us  that  there  are  other  problems  equally  important  con- 
nected with  this.  The  child  differs  from  the  adult  not  only  in 
the  degree  and  quantity  of  his  intelligence,  but  also  in  its  form. 
What  this  childish  form  of  intelligence  is,  we  do  not  yet  know.  In 
our  actual  experiments  we  have  only  caught  glimpses  of  it.  It 
certainly  demands  careful  study.  Moreover,  in  trying  to  trace 
the  lines  of  development  of  the  child's  intelligence,  we  naturally 
were  led  to  cast  a  glance  at  the  program  of  studies,  and  we  have 
found  that  certain  of  these  studies  are  premature,  that  is  to  say 
poorly  adapted  to  the  mental  receptivity  of  young  children.  In 
other  words,  the  relation  between  the  child's  intellectual  develop- 
ment and  the  course  of  study  constitutes  a  new  problem,  engrafted 
upon  the  first,  the  practical  interest  of  which  is  very  great.  There- 
fore, before  studying  the  intellectual  aptitudes  of  children  we 
shall  be  obliged  to  stop  a  while  at  these  two  stages :  (1)  special 
characteristics  of  the  child  mind,  and  (2)  the  relation  between  the 
intellectual  development  of  children  and  the  instruction  which 
they  receive.  In  the  present  article  will  be  found  some  attempts 
to  solve  these  interesting  questions. 

For  the  moment  we  must  content  ourselves  with  studying  what 
pertains  to  intellectual  development  and  the  processes  to  be  used 
in  measuring  it.  It  will  be  seen  that  these  researches  will  inter- 
est not  only  the  dilettanti  in  psychology  but  certainly  will  render 
great  service  to  psychiatry  and  to  medico-legal  surveys. 

Let  us  limit  our  subject  still  further.  In  previous  publications 
we  have  shown  that  it  is  possible  to  divide  the  methods  of  measur- 
ing intelligence  into  three  groups:  (1)  the  anatomical  method, 
(measurement  of  the  cranium,  of  the  face,  of  corporeal  develop- 
ment; observation  and  interpretation  of  stigmata  of  degeneracy, 
etc.);  (2)  the  pedagogical  method  (measurement  of  knowledge 
acquired  at  school,  principally  in  spelling  and  arithmetic);  (3) 
the  psychological  method  (measurement  of  the  uncultured  in- 
telligence). All  these  phases  of  the  same  study  are  rapidly  being 
developed  thanks  to  the  collaboration  of  a  few  persons  whom  we 
have  succeeded  in  interesting  in  them,  but  we  shall  present  else- 
where the  anatomical  and  pedagogical  study.  Here  we  shall 
consider  only  the  psychological  measurement  of  intelligence. 


184  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

This  measurement  is  taken  by  means  of  a  series  of  tests,  the 
gradation  of  which  constitutes  what  we  call  a  "Measuring  Scale 
of  Intelligence."  It  is  important,  above  all,  to  set  forth  these 
tests  with  sufficient  precision  to  enable  any  one  to  repeat  them 
correctly  who  will  take  the  trouble  bo  assimilate  them.^ 

To  avoid  making  our  description  a  monotonous  methodology, 
we  shall  describe  and  discuss  many  of  the  replies  obtained  from 
children  by  these  tests,  and  we  shall  try  through  all  our  experi- 
ments to  let  the  reader  form  a  picture  of  the  child  in  the  course  of 
its  development. 

Children  of  Three  Years  of  Age 

Pointing  to  nose,  eyes,  and  mouth.  One  of  the  clearest  signs  of 
awakening  intelligence  among  young  children  is  their  under- 
standing of  spoken  language.  For  a  long  time  the  young  child 
understands  only  gestures,  and  our  speech  has  affected  him  only 
by  the  intonation  of  the  voice.  Idiots  are  beings  who  remain 
all  their  lives  in  this  elementary  stage  unable  to  communicate 
with  their  fellows  through  language.  The  first  step  toward 
acquiring  a  language  is  its  comprehension.  We  understand  the 
thoughts  of  others  expressed  in  speech  before  we  are  able  to  ex- 
press our  own.  Consequently,  the  first  test  is  given  to  show  that 
the  child  understands  the  meaning  of  ordinary  words;  the  simplest 
way  that  he  can  prove  this  without  speech  is  to  execute  a  spoken 
command  in  the  fashion  of  the  mute;  our  test  consists  therefore 
in  ordering  him  to  touch  the  parts  of  his  face  which  he  knows 
best,  the  nose,  the  mouth,  the  eyes.  One  could  equally  well  show 
him  a  picture  containing  familiar  objects,  and'  when  his  atten- 
tion became  fixed  upon  the  picture  one  could  ask  him  some  very 

3  The  work  that  we  here  publish  is  so  long  and  minute  that  to  shorten  it 
we  omit  an  historical  sketch;  it  will  be  found  however  in  a  previous  vol- 
ume, of  rAnnee  psychologique  (Vol.  XI,  p.  163).  Let  us  recall  also  that 
M.  Decroly  and  Mile.  Degand  have  been  kind  enough  to  take  up  and  verify 
our  first  investigations  with  a  care  for  which  we  congratulate  them,  and  that 
the  Societe  de  pedologie  de  Bruxelles  has  put  these  investigations  in  their 
schedule  of  work.  All  our  successive  experiments  and  certain  new  ones 
have  been  made  either  at  TAsile  Sainte-Anne,  or  at  la  Salpetriere,  or  in 
the  primary  and  maternal  schools  of  Paris.  They  bear  therefore  always 
upon  children  of  the  so-called  working  class.  This  is  a  fact  to  be 
emphasized. 


1908   SCALE — THREE   YEARS  186 

simple  questions  inviting  an  analysis.  One  might  ask,  for  example, 
^' Where  is  the  chair?"  "Show  me  the  baby,"  "Show  me  the 
window,"  etc.  A  priori,  it  might  be  thought  that  the  child 
would  have  more  trouble  in  recognizing  an  object  in  a  picture, 
than  a  real  object.  Our  drawings  and  pictures  are  on  fiat  sur- 
faces, and  by  the  artifice  of  perspective  represent  the  three  di- 
mensions of  real  things.  They  are,  moreover,  very  much  reduced 
in  size.  One  might  conclude  that  for  these  reasons  it  is  more 
difficult  to  recognize  a  pictured  object  than  a  real  object  which  is 
before  one  and  which  has  color,  relief,  and  its  actual  size,  but  this 
is  only  an  a  priori  objection. 

In  fact,  every  child  who  finds  his  mouth  and  nose,  when  they 
are  named  to  him,  finds  equally  well  the  objects  which  he  is  asked 
to  look  for  in  a  picture,  on  condition  of  course  that  these  objects 
are  familiar  to  him  and  are  drawn  with  sufficient  correctness. 

To  conduct  this  test,  one  must  look  closely  at  the  child,  at- 
tract his  attention,  and  repeat  several  times,  "Show  me  your 
nose,"  or,  "Put  your  finger  on  your  nose,"  and  repeat  the  same 
order  for  the  eyes  and  the  mouth.  Sometimes  the  child  does  not 
execute  the  movement  because  he  is  distracted  or  because  he  is 
bashful  and  is  ashamed  of  what  is  requested  of  him.  But,  as  a  rule, 
with  a  little  insistence  he  is  readily  made  to  obey. ,  Sometimes  a 
child  shows  his  nose  by  thrusting  his  face  forward,/  without  mak- 
ing any  movement  with  his  hand,  or  indicates  his  mouth  by 
opening  it,  as  an  animal  would  do.  There  is,  indeed,  an  animal 
period  when  the  hand  is  still  a  paw  and  not  an  organ  serving  to 
make  signs  and  expressive  gestiu'es.  Since  this  test  and  those 
following  are  intended  especially  for  the  children  of  the  Maternal 
School  it  is  necessary  that  whoever  makes  the  experiment  know 
beforehand  that  many  among  the  very  young  children,  especially 
those  three  or  four  years  old,  remain  silent  and  motionless  when 
they  are  asked  questions.  Some  decide  to  perform  little  acts 
such  as  pointing  to  the  nose  but  do  not  want  to  speak;  speech 
seems  to  be  harder  to  them  than  gestures.  The  directresses  of 
the  Maternal  School  can  always  point  out  children  who  in  the 
classroom  never  answer  the  teacher,  sometimes  even  after  two 
years  of  acquaintance.  The  greater  number  of  these  silent  chil- 
dren speak  and  prattle  with  their  companions,  and  are  mute 
only  in  the  class-room.  Others,  indeed,  speak  to  no  one — ^neither 
teacher  nor  school  companions,  but  do  speak  in  their  homes,  at 


186  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

l6ast  so  their  parents  assure  us.  The  teachers  have  great  trouble 
in  training  them.  We  recall  a  charming  directress  of  the  Mater- 
nal School  at  Fontainebleau  who  told  us  that  for  two  years  she 
could  not  succeed  in  making  a  little  four-year-old  boy  talk,  but 
finally  succeeded  with  the  help  of  a  cat.  One  day  she  left  the 
child  in  a  room  with  the  animal,  and,  little  by  little,  the  child 
spoke  to  the  cat  and  said  "Good  morning,  pussy."  From  that 
moment  the  miracle  had  taken  place,  his  tongue  had  been  loosened. 

One  may  easily  imagine  the  difficulty  attending  such  an  experi- 
ment when  such  cases  of  silence  are  met  with.  What  is  to  be  done? 
It  is  often  useful  to  ask  the  teacher  to  interfere.  If  she  is  intelli- 
gent enough,  she  will  know  how  to  talk  to  the  little  folk,  to  re- 
assure them  and  make  them  respond.  A  little  caress  to  one,  a 
little  chiding  to  another,  and  all  goes  well.  Sometimes  we  have 
seen  children  declare  they  could  not  perform  what  was  requested  of 
them,  and  remain  obstinate  in  their  refusal.  For  instance,  upon 
being  asked  to  make  a  bow  with  some  ribbons,  they  not  only  would 
not  do  it,  but  even  refused  to  touch  the  ribbons;  yet  after  having 
been  rather  severely  reprimanded  they  would  consent  and  would 
then  make  an  attractive  bow. 

Repetition  of  sentences.^  After  the  comprehension  of  words, 
the  most  simple  manifestation  of  language  consists  not,  as  might 
be  believed,  in  expressing  a  thought,  in  giving  the  name  of  an 
object,  but  in  the  repetition  of  a  word  spoken  before  him.  We 
have  discovered  that  it  is  easier  to  repeat  a  word  than  to  take  the 
initiative  in  speaking,  that  is  to  say  to  pass  from  the  idea  to  the 
word.  We  have  found  proof  of  this  among  imbeciles,  and  it 
helps  us  in  the  study  of  the  normal  child.  The  repetition  of  a 
word  or  a  sentence  is  rather  easily  obtained  from  young  children, 
say  three  years  of  age,  if  the  child  is  willing  to  try.  But  it  is 
sometimes  difficult  to  know  if  the  repetition  is  correct,  for  the 
young  child  has  a  natural  defect  in  pronunciation,  which  we  call 
"hafouillage'^  and  which  consists  in  mutilating  the  words  or  in 
articulating  them  indistinctly.  These  mumblings  are  not  due  to 
a  definite  defect  of  pronunciation  which  might  be  caused  by  an 
anatomical  defect  nor  to  an  imperfect  functioning  of  the  phonetic 
organs.  It  is  due  simply  and  wholly  to  awkwardness  and  not 
only  affects  the  articulation  of  the  words,  but  also  modifies  their 

*  See  also  p.  58,  1905  scale. 


1908   SCALE — THEEE   YEAKS  187 

intellectual  value;  thus,  instead  of  saying,  ^^Tai  donne  deux  sous  au 
mendiant'^  (I  gave  two  sous  to  the  beggar),  he  will  say,  "dla 
mendiant;"  and  instead  of  saying  "7Z  nefaut  pas  fair e  de  mal  aux 
oiseaux, "  (You  must  not  hurt  the  birds)  he  will  say  "  a  les  oiseaux.^* 
Moreover  other  errors,  very  much  like  these,  consist  in  replacing 
the  language  of  adults  by  childish  language.  Instead  of  saying, 
''Nous  irons  a  la  campagne"  (We  are  going  to  the  country)  they 
say,  "On  ira  a  la  campagne"  (One  will  go  to  the  country). 

For  this  test  the  following  sentences  are  to  be  used  which  have 
been  piu*posely  composed  of  words  easily  understood. 

"It  rains.    I  am  hungry. "  (6  syllables.) 

"  They  call  me  Gaston.    Oh!  this  naughty  dog. "     (10  syllables.) 

"We  are  going  for  a  walk.  Mary,  let  me  see  your  pretty  hat.'* 
(16  syllables.) 

These  sentences  are  to  be  said  with  expression  by  the  experi- 
menter. Do  not  tolerate  any  kind  of  error  in  the  repetition. 
If  the  child  remains  silent,  intimidated,  set  him  going  by  having 
him  repeat  shorter  sentences;  here  we  give  our  whole  game: 

"Papa.''     (2  syllables.) 

"My  hat.    Her  shoe."     (4  syllables.) 

"It  rains.    I  am  hungry."     (6  syllables.) 

"/  have  a  handkerchief.    I  have  clean  hands."     (8  syllables.) 

^^They  call  me  Gaston.     Oh!  the  naughty  dog."     (10  syllables.) 

"It  rains  in  the  garden.  Joseph  does  his  lessons.  We  are  hav- 
ing a  pleasant  time.    I  caught  a  little  mouse. "     (14  syllables) . 

"  We  are  going  for  a  walk.  Mary,  let  me  see  your  pretty  hat. " 
"Charlotte  has  just  torn  her  pretty  dress.  I  gave  two  sous  to  a  poor 
beggar."     (18  syllables.) 

"My  child,  it  is  not  right  to  hurt  the  birds.  It  is  dark,  everyone 
should  be  in  bed. "     (20  syllables.) 

A  three-year-old  child  repeats  a  sentence  of  6  syllables.  He 
can  not  repeat  one  of  10. 

Repetition  of  figures.^  The  repetition  of  figures  requires  about 
the  same  kind  of  effort  as  that  of  sentences,  except  that  the  sense 
of  figures  is  less  obvious  than  that  of  words;  in  this  case  no  help 
is  gained  from  the  comprehension  of  what  is  said;  greater  atten- 
tion is  required  and  the  task  is  more  difficult.  It  is  a  natural 
conclusion,  therefore,  that  a  child  three  years  old  who  can  repeat 

»  See  p.  53,  1905  scale. 


188  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

a  sentence  of  six  words  cannot  repeat  more  than  2  figures,  which 
shows  that,  owing  to  the  suggestion  of  ideas  the  power  of  memory 
is  as  it  were  trebled. 

The  method  of  performing  this  experiment  is  as  follows : 

One  warns  the  child  that  he  must  listen  and  then  repeat  what 
is  said  to  him.  Begin  by  pronouncing  a  single  figure.  The  child 
repeats  it.  Next  pronounce  two  figures  which  are  not  consecutive, 
for  example,  3-7,  or  6^,  etc.  Pronounce  these  slowly,  at  an 
interval  of  half  a  second.  If  there  is  any  error  in  the  repetition, 
or  if  the  child  has  defective  speech  which  prevents  the  exact  un- 
derstanding of  what  he  has  said,  begin  again.  It  suffices  for  the 
test  to  be  passed  if  the  exact  repetition  is  correct  once  out  of  three 
trials.  If  the  child  can  repeat  two  figures,  try  three,  at  the  same 
rate  of  two  a  second  always  avoiding  intonation.  Here  again 
one  success  out  of  three  trials  suffices  for  the  test  to  be  passed. 
Many  young  children  three  years  old,  who  easily  repeat  two  figures, 
are  incapable  of  repeating  three.  The  addition  of  one  more  figure 
enormously  increases  the  difficulty.  If  three  figures  can  be  re- 
peated, try  five,  always  under  the  same  conditions  of  speed  and 
pronunciation,  accepting  one  success  out  of  three  trials. 

Note  also  how  much  more  difficult  it  is  to  repeat  five  figures 
than  three.  The  errors  made  by  children  in  these  various  repe- 
titions are  of  several  kinds;  first,  complete  silence;  second,  de- 
fective pronunciation,  a  sort  of  vagueness  or  haziness  in  the  pro- 
nimciation;  third,  partial  repetition  with  a  tendency  to  give  only 
the  last  figures  heard,  sometimes  only  the  last  one;  and  fourth, 
a  tendency  to  invent  figures  which  have  not  been  given.  This 
is  no  haphazard  invention.  It  is  an  application  of  the  natural 
order  of  the  figures.  For  instance,  a  subject  who  has  been  given 
the  series  5,  8,  2,  7,  4  readily  says,  5,  8,  2,  3,  4,  because  the  ''2'' 
naturally  calls  up  the  ''3."  Sometimes  this  phenomenon  is  still 
more  marked,  and  is  so  striking  that  it  indicates  great  weakness  of 
the  critical  sense.  A  young  child,  who  has  completely  forgotten 
the  figures  0,  8,  2,  7,  9,  will  say  1,  2,  3,  4,  5,  6,  etc. 

Presentation  of  a  picture.  With  children  pictures  render  in- 
valuable service.  The  eyes  of  even  the  most  inattentive  child 
shine  when  he  is  shown  a  picture.  It  is  an  almost  certain  means 
of  captivating  him.  Pictures  may  serve  many  ends;  as  we  have 
already  said  they  may  be  used  for  the  designation  of  objects. 
We  shall  now  show  how  they  may  be  used  to  make  a  child  talk. 


1908    SCALE — THREE    YEARS  189 

A  preceding  test  has  shown  us  that  the  child  passes  from  the  word 
to  the  designation  of  the  object.  Now  let  us  try  to  make  him  do 
the  reverse,  which  is  infinitely  more  difficult  for  him,  making  him 
pass  from  the  object  to  the  word.  Here  the  object  is  a  picture, 
a  scene  full  of  meaning,  containing  a  multitude  of  objects  which 
he  knows  and  at  which  he  likes  to  look.  Let  us  ask  him  to  tell 
us  what  he  sees.  Not  only  will  he  talk  and  bring  all  of  his  vocab- 
ulary to  bear  upon  the  expression  of  his  ideas,  but  he  is  free  to 
look  at  and  to  choose  what  he  pleases  in  the  picture;  he  will, 
therefore,  show  us  what  to  him  is  most  striking,  and,  at  the  same 
time,  what  idea  directs  him,  what  is  his  mentality,  how  he  perceives,  ^ 
how  he  interprets,  how  he  reasons^  l^ 

This  test  has  the  remarkable  advantage  of  serving  in  the  diag-- 
nosis  of  three  different  intellectual  levels.  The  replies  indicate 
whether  the  subject  is  at  the  intellectual  level  of  three,  seven  or 
twelve  years.  Very  few  tests  yield  so  much  information  as  this 
one.  If  we  add  that  this  test  is  one  which  pleases  young  children 
the  most,  and  succeeds  in  overcoming  the  obstinate  silence  of  the 
very  smallest  ones  we  are  justified  in  concluding  that  we  have 
found  here,  by  chance,  a  test  of  exceptional  value.  We  place  it 
above  all  the  others,  and  if  we  were  obliged  to  retain  only  one, 
we  should  not  hesitate  to  select  this  one. 

We  used  the  three  pictures  which  are  reproduced  in  the  text. 
We  could,  if  necessary,  substitute  other  similar  pictures,  but  these 
are  of  known  difficulty  which  has  been  measured,  and,  therefore 
should  be  preferred  to  others.  All  of  th^m  contain  persons  and  a 
theme.  This  is  the  essential  requisite.  They  are  mounted  on 
cardboard.  We  present  them  one  after  the  other  to  the  child, 
asking  him,  ''What  is  this?"  Sometimes  if  the  child  is  very 
young,  he  answers  naively,  ''It  is  a  picture,"  or,  "It  is  a  post 
card."  We  then  ask  the  question  in  another  form.  "Tell  me 
what  you  see  there."  It  is  very  rare,  altogether  exceptional,, 
that  the  child  remains  silent.  Even  a  three-year-old  child  casts 
a  glance  of  curiosity  at  the  picture,  which  lends  itself  to  the  most 
childish,  as  well  as  to  the  most  learned  reflections.  The  replies 
obtained  are  of  three  distinct  types,  each  of  which  characterizes 
a  different  intellectual  level. 

1.  Replies  by  enumeration.  These  are  the  most  elementary. 
The  young  child  simply  names  the  people  and  the  objects  which 
he   recognizes   in   the   picture.     He   enumerates    them    without 


190 


DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 


establishing  any  connection  between  them.  He  simply  pro- 
nounces common  nouns.  In  its  most  elementary  form,  this 
amounts  to  saying,  "s.  man,  a  woman,  a  papa,  a  carriage,  a  little 
child."  Or,  again,  some  very  young  children  use  the  definite 
article,  as  'Hhe  child,"  'Hhe  man,"  "the  lady."  Sometimes 
instead  of  indicating  people,  objects  are  singled  out,  "a,  bed," 
or  perhaps,  "  a  table. "  Notice  that  it  is  the  object  which  is  named 
and  not  the  action.  A  child  three  years  old  will  say,  "a  man;" 
we  never  have  found  one  who  said,  looking  at  the  second  picture, 


FIG. 


"he  is  sleeping;"  not  one  who  paid  attention  to  the  action,  or  to 
the  characteristics  of  the  persons.  At  least  a  child  three  years 
old  who  would  make  such  a  remark  would  be  far  superior  to  his 
age.  At  three  years,  therefore,  the  child  is  at  the  stage  of  recog-_ 
nitionand  identification  of  objects.  This  is  the  important,  funda- 
mental  work  of  sensory  perception,  the  one  in  relation  to  which  all 
the  other  processes  of  perception  are  complementary  and  acces- 
sory. 


1908    SCALE THREE    YEARS 


191 


One  would  suppose  the  development  of  this  fundamental  proc- 
ess of  identification  might  take  place  in  many  different  ways. 
In  reality  it  takes  place  by  simple  addition,  i.e.,  the  number  of 
objects  identified  increases.  For  each  picture,  two,  three  or  four 
objects  are  designated  instead  of  one.  When  there  are  several 
identifications,  another  question  arises,  that  of  order.  Accord- 
ing to  our  observations  a  child  looking  at  our  three  pictures  singles 
out  people  first,  but  there  are  exceptions  to  this  rule,  for  sometimes 
an  inanimate  object  is  named  first.     Thus,  for  the  third  picture: 


FIG.  2 


''Two  tables,  a  chair,  a  bed,  a  man."  For  the  second  picture: 
''a  man,  a  woman,  a  bench."  For  the  first:  "a  cart,  a  man,  a 
pail,  a  basket."  At  times,  through  suggestion,  a  curious  mistake 
arises  in  the  examination  of  the  first  picture.  Looking  at  the 
cart  the  child  says,  ''a  cart,  a  horse." 

There  is  a  third  stage  rather  superior  to  the  preceding:  the 
names  are  no  longer  given  separately,  but  are  connected  in  a  very 
elementary  manner  with  the  conjunctions  andj  with,  and  then, 
e.g.,  ''a  man  and  a  woman"  "a  cart  and  then  a  man"  ^'a  man  with 


192  DEVELOPMENT    OF   INTELLIGENCE 

a  woman,''  etc.  Occasionally  with  rather  old  but  backward 
children,  we  meet  with  a  type  of  answer  by  enumeration,  which 
presents  very  special  characteristics.  The  enumeration  persists 
but  a  great  number  of  objects  are  designated,  whereas,  on  the 
contrary,  the  enumeration  of  a  very  young  normal  child  is  very 
brief.     This  difference  is  easily  explained.    A  backward  child,  11 


FIG.  3 


years  old,  who  has  only  the  intellectual  level  of  a  child  of  6  or  7 
years,  has,  nevertheless,  the  advantage  over  the  latter  of  a  larger 
experience;  having  lived  longer,  he  has  at  his  command  a  more 

extensive  vocabulary.     For  example:  Mad ,  a  boy  ten  and  a 

half  years,  who  has  the  intellectual  level  of  a  child  of  seven  years 
(we  shall  explain  later  how  we  are  able  to  determine  the  intellectual 


1908   SCALE — THREE   YEARS  193 

level  so  accurately)  gives  us  the  following  detailed  enumeration 
when  looking  at  the  first  picture.  '*/  see  an  old  man,  and  also  a 
child,  there  is  a  flood,  there  is  water,  a  carriage,  a  basket,  a  brush, 
a  pail,  two  wheels,  a  carpet.''     Another  still  more  characteristic 

example  of  enumeration  full  of  details  is  afforded  by  Lau ,  a 

child  13  years  old,  who  intellectually  is  four  years  retarded.  He 
said,  ''A  man,  a  cart,  a  child,  a  pail,  a  basket;  back  there  a  piece  of 
wood,  back  there  rocks. "  In  all  these  instances  we  record  the  type 
of  answer  which  is  given  most  frequently. 

2.  Replies  by  description.  This  belongs  to  the  level  of  seven  years 
whereas  the  answers  by  enumeration  are  of  the  level  of  three  years. 
One  sees  that  the  difference  is  great.  The  characteristics  of  the 
people  and  the  nature  of  the  things  are  now  pointed  out.  More- 
over, attention  is  paid  to  the  relation  of  objects,  with  the  result 
that  instead  of  simple  words,  sentences  are  used.     For  example: 

First  picture.  ■  There  is  a  man  and  a  little  boy  pulling  a  cart. 

Second  picture.     A  man  and  a  woman  are  sleeping  on  a  bench. 

Third  picture.  There  is  a  man  standing  on  his  bed  to  look  through 
the  window.     A  man  looking  in  a  mirror. 

S.  Replies  by  interpretation.  The  subject  of  the  scene,  or  the 
nature  of  the  people  is  simply  indicated  either  by  a  suggesting 
word,  or  by  comments,  and  often  there  is  an  element  of  emotion, 
of  sadness  or  of  sympathy.  This  emotion  may  have  been  present 
in  children  who  gave  simpler  answers,  but  they  did  not  know  how 
to  express  it. 

The  answers  which  follow  we  call  answers  by  interpretation, 
because  the  comments  go  beyond  what  is  visible  in  the  picture; 
there  is  a  real  search  for  causes,  a  conjecture.  First  picture.  A 
rag  picker.  There  is  a  poor  man  moving  his  household  goods.  They 
are  people  who  are  moving  away  without  having  paid  the  rent.  There 
is  a  working  man.  Second  picture.  It  is  poverty.  An  unfortu- 
nate. They  are  unfortunates  sitting  on  a  bench  who  have  no  home 
where  they  can  go  to  sleep.  It  is  night,  there  are  unfortunates. 
Third  picture.  A  prisoner.  This  shows  a  prisoner,  a  man  who  is 
in  prison,  who  is  standing  on  his  bed  to  look  through  the  window  of 
his  prison,  which  is  barred.  The  words  unfortunate,  moving 
away,  and  prisoner  used  in  the  answer  warrant  us  in  concluding 
that  the  theme  of  the  picture  has  been  interpreted. 

We  cannot  resist  making  a  philosophical  remark  upon  the 
hierarchy  which  we  have  made  of  these  replies.     An  onlooker  who 


^ 


194  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

is  opposed  to  this  theory ,  might  object  that  the  answers  by  descrip- 
tion are  superior  to  those  by  interpretation,  because  they  are  less 
liable  to  error,  they  state  only  known  facts,  adding  nothing  to 
them,  whereas  the  interpretation  is  conjectural  and  may  be  sim- 
ply fancy.  "Hypotheses  non  jingo, ^^  this  critic  observes.  We 
know  that  this  has  occasioned  many  discussions  in  science.  The 
fact  which  we  have  just  gleaned  from  our  studies  with  children, 
well  deserves  to  be  considered  as  an  argument  in  the  debate. 
Since  only  older  children  attempt  interpretation  we  are  obliged 
to  conclude  that  interpretation  belongs  to  an  intellectual  level 
superior  to  that  of  description.  But  the  question  is  complicated, 
for  not  only  must  attention  be  paid  to  the  intellectual  level  but 
also  to  the  deviations  and  errors  which  may  occur  in  this  same 
level.  We  recall  having  shown  our  pictures  to  an  adult  of  whose 
stupidity  we  were  well  aware.  His  interpretations  were  many  and 
of  a  peculiar  order.  For  example,  the  first  picture  inspired  the 
following  reply:  "It  is  a  scene  which  is  taking  place  in  the  month  of 
February  J  ^  Let  us  analyze  this  conjecture.  It  is  evidently  an 
interpretation,  but  without  apparent  foundation,  and  one  that  is 
impossible  to  confirm  or  to  refute.  The  scene  could  have  taken 
place  equally  well  in  October,  November,  December,  January  or 
even  March.  Why  then  this  precision  which  is  so  useless  and  un- 
warranted? The  reply  of  this  individual  must  be  ranked  among 
interpretations,  and  in  our  classification  it  is  superior  to  the  de- 
scriptive reply  of  a  seven  year  old  child;  but,  besides  this,  it  dis- 
plays a  lack  of  judgment,  and  this  lack  of  judgment  is  independent 
of  the  hierarchy  of  the  replies. 

Family  name.  We  conclude  this  brief  study  of  the  three  year 
old  child  by  asking  him  for  a  bit  of  information  which  he  should 
possess — ^his  family  name.  All  children  of  this  age,  of  course, 
know  their  first  name,  or  the  diminutive  by  which  they  are 
usually  called.  But  the  family  name  is  less  familiar  to  them. 
Nevertheless,  they  are  asked  for  it  in  the  school;  at  the  Maternal 
School  they  are  usually  addressed  by  their  family  name. 

We  ask  a  child  therefore,  ''What  is  your  name?"     If  he  replies 
only  by  his  first  name  we  insist  on  knowing  his  family  name 
"Roger?    And  then?    And  what  else?  etc." 

It  happens  sometimes  that  the  child  gives  another  name  than 
the  one  by  which  he  is  enrolled.  To  explain  these  errors  one  must 
remember  that  there  are  many  illegitimate  children,  and,  what  is 


1908   SCALE — FOUR  YEARS  195 

more  pitiable,  the  child^s  mother  has  had  different  husbands,  and 
the  name  which  the  child  bears  in  succeeding  years  is  not  always 
the  same. 

When  a  child  is  not  able  to  give  his  family  name  one  must  not 
ask  him  for  that  of  his  mother,  for  this  question  is  too  difficult  for 
a  three  year  old  child,  and  the  reply  ''She's  called  Mama"  cannot 
be  taken  as  a  bad  answer  for  this  age. 

Children  Four  Years  of  Age 

Sex  of  the  child.  "Are  you  a  little  boy  or  a  little  girl?"  Such 
is  the  very  simple  question  which  we  ask.  Not  all  three  year  old 
children  answer  this  question.  The  correct  reply  is,  "A  little 
girl,"  or  ''A  little  boy."  Sometimes  the  child  simply  says,'' Yes," 
or,  "No."  Under  these  circumstances  ask  two  separate  questions, 
"Are  you  a  little  boy?"  "Are  you  a  little  girl?"  At  thi&  age  the 
least  thing  distracts  a  child. 

Three  year  old  children  may  make  a  mistake,  but  a  normal 
four  year  old  child  will  always  answer  correctly  when  asked  its  sex. 
Besides,  it  is  reasonable  to  suppose  that  between  the  third  and 
fourth  years  a  marked  change  takes  place  in  the  mental  state  of 
the  child. 

Naming  familiar  objects.  This  is  another  exercise  of  spoken 
language,  but  is  not  at  all  like  the  language  suggested  by  the  pic- 
tures, being  much  more  difficult.  In  a  picture  the  child  named 
what  interested  him,  or  what  he  could  name,  whereas  in  this  test 
the  object  is  shown  him  and  he  must  tell  the  name  of  that  object 
and  not  of  some  other.  Perhaps  at  first  sight  this  is  a  distinction 
which  seems  trivial,  but  in  reality  it  is  very  significant,  the  proof 
of  which  is  that  the  majority  of  three  year  old  children  succeed  in 
the  test  with  the  pictures,  but  fail  at  giving  the  names  of  objects. 
Moreover,  objects  are  a  little  less  familiar  than  men  and  women, 
which  the  child  names  by  preference  in  the  picture. 

Show  the  child  three  familiar  objects  one  after  the  other,  a  key, 
a  closed  pen-knife,  and  a  sou,  and  ask  him,  "What  is  this?" 
"What  is  it  called?"  The  key  is  named  readily  though  sometimes 
with  defective  enunciation.  The  pen-knife  is  usually  called  a 
knife,  and  the  sou,  sous.  We  excuse  these  trifling  errors,  but  the 
names  of  the  three  objects  must  be  correct. 

We  chose  these  three  objects  because  any  experimenter  ordi- 


196  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

narily  has  them  m  his  pocket,  and  in  order  to  avoid  as  much  as 
possible  the  trouble  of  preparing  special  materials. 

Repeating  three  figures.  This  test  is  given  as  the  test  with  the 
two  figures.     We  need  not  repeat.® 

Comparing  two  lines.  Here  is  another  test,  whose  difficulty- 
could  not  be  foreseen.  An  imbecile  who  understands  when  told, 
''Go  shut  the  door,"  and  who  executes  the  verbal  order  given 
without  gesture  or  glance,  can  not  compare  the  length  of  two 
lines  placed  before  him.  Does  he  see  that  the  two  lines  are  of  un- 
equal length?  It  is  possible.  If  he  were  offered  two  crackers 
would  he  take  the  longer  one  to  eat?  That  is  yet  to  be  investi- 
gated. But  he  does  not  understand  the  words,  "the  longer;"  he 
does  not  comprehend  that  he  is  required  to  make  a  comparison, 
and  so  he  stupidly  puts  his  finger  in  the  space  between  the  two  lines. 
A  three  year  old  child  does  the  same.  It  is  only  at  four  years 
that  they  perform  the  operation  correctly. 

The  test  is  conducted  as  follows.  On  a  sheet  of  white  paper  draw 
with  ink  two  straight  horizontal  lines,  one  5  cm.  long,  the  other  6 
cm.,  parallel  and  3  cm.  apart.  Show  the  lines  to  the  child  and  say, 
''You  see  these  lines,  tell  me  which  is  the  longer?"  No  hesita- 
tion is  tolerated.  Sometimes  the  child  puts  his  finger  between 
the  two  lines.  If  he  does  not  correct  himself  immediately,  this 
constitutes  failure.  This  test  is  rapid,  easy  to  execute  and  easy 
to  interpret. 

Children  Five  Years  of  Age 

Comparison  of  two  weights. '^  This  comparison  is  the  same  as  that 
of  the  fines,  except  that  the  lines  are  compared  by  a  glance,  where- 
as the  boxes  must  be  taken  in  the  hand  and  weighed,  often  several 
times  in  succession.  Hardly  any  children  below  five  years  suc- 
ceed in  this  test,  while  a  child  of  four  years  succeeds  in  comparing 
lines. 

For  this  test,  use  four  boxes,  all  of  the  same  volume,  and  which 
weigh  respectively,  3  grams  and  12  grams,  6  grams  and  15  grams. 
The  3  and  12  gram  boxes  are  shown  first.  They  are  placed  on  a 
table  before  the  child  about  5  or  6  cm.  apart.  Say  to  the  child, 
"You  see  these  boxes;  tell  me  which  is  heavier?" 

The  most  satisfactory  reply  consists  in  taking  the  boxes,  weigh- 

«  See  p.  53,  1905  scale.  ^  g^e  p.  55,  1905  scale. 


1908    SCALE FIVE    YEABS  '  197 

ing  them  one  after  the  other  in  the  same  hand,  or  at  the  same  time 
in  both  hands,  and  then  indicating  the  12  gram  box.  To  be  sure 
that  the  choice  is  not  the  result  of  chance,  the  6  and  15  gram  boxes 
are  then  shown,  and  then  the  first  two  boxes  are  again  given  the 
child,  and  he  is  requested  to  compare  them  once  more.  If  there 
is  the  slightest  doubt  the  test  should  be  repeated. 

A  very  young  child  proceeds  differently.  When  he  is  asked  to 
tell  which  box  is  heavier  he  replies  at  once  by  pointing  to  one  of 
the  boxes  by  chance  without  weighing  them.  We  are  indulgent 
and  readily  pass  over  this  naive  blunder,  which  is  explained  some- 
times by  the  thoughtlessness  of  the  child,  or  by  suggestibility,  or 
by  a  desire  to  please  us,  and  we  say  to  him,  ''No,  that  is  not  right. 
You  must  take  the  two  boxes  in  your  hand  and  weigh  them." 
This  supplementary  instruction  suffices  for  orienting  many  sub- 
jects; as  for  the  others  they  are  not  considered  except  that  we 
have  observed  with  interest  the  mistakes  they  have  made.  Here 
are  some  of  them;  weighing  only  one  of  the  boxes  and  declaring 
that  it  is  the  heavier;  putting  the  two  boxes  side  by  side  in  the 
sa'me  hand  and  saying  that  one  of  them  is  heavier  than  the  other 
(in  this  case  the  weighing,  although  much  more  difficult,  is  not 
impossible) ;  finally,  placing  the  two  boxes  on  top  of  each  other  and 
in  the  same  hand ;  this  again  is  more  imperfect  as  a  means  of  weigh- 
ing but  it  is  nevertheless  possible  to  make  an  accurate  judgment. 

Let  us  note  that  this  test  includes  two  very  distinct  operations, 
one  of  which  consists  in  understanding  that  the  weights  of  the 
two  boxes  must  be  compared,  and  in  acting  accordingly;  another 
which  consists  in  appreciating  the  difference  between  the  two 
weights.  The  first  operation  is  much  more  difficult  than  the  sec- 
ond; we  may  say  that  it  depends  on  the  general  intelligence  of  the 
child,  and  presupposes  a  rather  high  intellectual  level,  while  the 
second  rests  on  the  much  more  simple  faculty  of  sensing  a  differ- 
ence, which  requires  a  much  lower  intellectual  level,  perhaps  only 
of  two  years.  This  is  proved  by  the  fact  that,  in  spite  of  all  ex- 
planation given  him,  if  the  child  does  not  succeed  by  himself  in  tak- 
ing the  boxes  and  weighing  them,  it  generally  suffices  to  place  the 
boxes  one  in  each  of  his  hands  and  to  ask  him  which  is  the  heavier, 
in  order  to  obtain  a  correct  answer.  It  is  amusing  to  observe  the 
contrast  between  the  awkwardness  with  which  a  little  child  takes 
the  boxes,  weighs  them  and  compares  them,  and  the  assurance 
which  he  exhibits  in  sensing  the  difference  in  their  weight. 


198 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 


Copying  a  square.  This  is  the  first  time  that  we  place  a  pen  in 
the  hand  of  a  child.  ^^ 

With  ink  draw  a  square,  3  or  4  cm.  on  a  side,  and  ask  the  child 
to  copy  it  using  a  pen.  The  use  of  the  pen  increases  the  difficulty 
and  it  should  not  be  replaced  by  a  pencil.  Yoimg  children  make 
the  figure  smaller,  but  that  does  not  matter,  so  long  as  one  can 
recognize  it. 


FIG.  4 

We  give  here  some  reproductions  of  drawings  which  we  consider 
satisfactory  (1,  2,  3),  and  others  which  we  consider  so  imperfect 
that  they  constitute  failures  (4,  5,  6). 

''Game  of  patience."  This  is  a  game  which  amuses  children;  at 
the  school,  children  amuse  themselves  by  building  things  with 
blocks.  It  is  a  game,  but  at  the  same  time  a  work  of  the  intelli- 
gence, involving  materials,  sensations  and  movements.  When  one 
analyzes  the  operation  it  is  found  to  be  composed  of  the  following 
elements:  (1)  Consciousness  of  the  end  to  be  attained,  that  is  to 
say,  a  figure  to  be  produced;  this  end  must  be  understood,  and 
kept  in  mind;  (2)  the  trying  of  various  combinations  under  the 
influence  of  this  directing  idea,  which  often  unconsciously  deter- 
mines the  kind  of  attempt  which  should  be  made;  (3)  judging  the 
combination  formed,  comparing  it  with  the  model,  and  deciding 
if  it  resembles  the  other. 

This  little  puzzle  at  first  sight  presents  the  advantage  that  its 


1908    SCALE — FIVE   YEARS  199 

difficulty  may  be  increased  at  will.  There  are  some  games  easily 
solved  by  a  five  year  old  child  and  others  so  complicated  that  they 
severely  try  the  skill  of  an  adult.  We  began  by  choosing  a  very 
difficult  game  of  patience,  and  our  reason  for  abandoning  it  is 
worth  explaining.  It  was  because  chance  played  too  great  a  part 
in  its  success.  The  game  consisted  in  rearranging  a  card  cut  into 
ten  pieces;  if  by  good  fortune  one  combined  correctly  the  first  two 
or  three  pieces,  the  rest  was  easy  to  guess.  On  the  contrary,  if 
chance  were  not  favorable  the  problem  became  much  more  diffi- 
cult and  the  best  intelligence  might  fail.  It  was  proved  that  in 
certain  cases  success  was  quite  independent  of  age.  This  objec- 
tion, suggested  by  experience,  decided  us  to  abandon  this  type  of 
puzzle. 

The  one  which  we  have  now  definitely  adopted  is  so  simple  that 
it  leaves  no  room  for  chance.  It  is  adapted  to  five  year  old  chil- 
dren and  contains  only  two  pieces. 

Cut  in  halves  along  the  diagonal,  a  card  which  had  the  form  of 
an  elongated  rectangle,  thus  obtaining  two  triangles.  Place  on 
the  table  a  similar  card  which  is  uncut,  and  put  the  two  triangular 
pieces  in  front  of  the  child  in  such  a  way  that  the  two,  hypothe- 
nuses  are  not  adjacent  and  tell  the  child,  "Put  these  two  pieces 
together;  reunite  these  two  fragments  so  as  to  make  a  figure  like 
this  one,"  indicating  the  uncut  card. 

Only  a  third  of  the  four  year  old  children  can  reconstruct  the 
rectangle.  The  others  do  not  understand  what  is  wanted;  they 
move  the  pieces  of  cardboard  about  at  random,  or  they  refrain 
from  touching  them;  or,  they  put  them  together  incorrectly;  they 
place  them  side  by  side  without  connecting  them;  or  they  cover 
one  piece  with  the  other;  or,  finally,  they  form  a  figure  which  has 
no  resemblance  to  the  model.  At  five  years  there  has  been  definrte 
progress,  hardly  one  child  in  twelve  fails. 

Some  precautions  must  be  observed  in  this  test.  We  wish  to 
emphasize  these  three : 

1.  Some  little  children  do  not  want  to  take  the  trouble  to  move 
the  pieces  of  cardboard,  or  even  touch  them.  In  this  case,  with- 
out giving  them  any  precise  suggestion,  it  is  necessary  to  chide 
them  a  little  to  arouse  them  from  their  indifference.  We  consider 
as  having  failed  those  who  persist  in  uniting  the  pieces  at  random, 
or  who  cover  one  with  the  other. 

2.  In  this  test,  care  must  be  taken  not  to  let  the  child  overturn 


200  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

one  of  the  pieces  of  cardboard,  for  in  that  case  it  would  be  impos- 
sible to  make  a  figure  like  the  model.  If  he  overturns  the  card- 
board accidentally  and  does  not  notice  the  difference,  the  test 
should  be  repeated,  or  else  consider  the  test  passed  if  the  two 
pieces  are  put  together  with  their  longest  sides  adjacent. 

3.  During  the  test  the  child  often  stops  and  looks  at  us  as  if  to 
get  our  opinion.  According  to  what  he  may  read  on  our  faces,  he 
may  feel  satisfied  with  his  work  or  he  may  try  something  else. 
One  must  express  nothing,  must  know  how  to  wait,  and  must  wait 
in  silence. 

Counting  four  single  sous.  Counting  is  the  last  test  we  make  for 
five  year  old  children.  The  objection  may  be  raised  that  this  is  a 
test  of  scholastic  training  which  indicates  the  instruction  rather 
than  the  intelligence  of  the  child.  This  is  true;  but  what  being  is 
there  so  deprived  of  training  that  he  has  not  been  taught  to  count? 
We  have  studied  many  imbeciles  in  institutions  and  all  of  those 
who  have  intelligence  sufficient  for  counting  have  learned  to  count. 
In  spite  of  the  laws  for  compulsory  education  there  are  many  illit- 
erates; among  soldiers,  they  say,  these  amount  to  more  than  5  per 
cent;  but  has  anyone  ever  encountered  any  individual  who  has 
never  learned  to  count,  if  his  intelligence  permitted  it?  They 
must,  indeed,  be  rare. 

The  study  of  the  act  of  counting  is  extremely  complicated,  and 
it  will  be  seen  from  what  follows  that  we  have  many  times  in  our 
measuring  scale  made  use  of  this  simple  operation  realizing  that 
it  has  great  social  significance.  To  be  able  to  count,  one  must 
know  many  things;  first  one  must  be  able  to  recite  the  list  of  fig- 
ures correctly,  then  be  able  to  apply  each  number  to  a  different 
object.  We  have  not  taken  as  a  test  the  simple  recitation  of  the 
figures,  because  that  is  merely  a  matter  of  memory;  we  prefer  the 
act  of  counting  which  presupposes  some  judgment.  We  ask  the 
child  to  count  four  sous. 

Place  side  by  side  four  single  sous  on  a  table,  but  not  covering 
one  another.  Say  to  the  child:  ''You  see  these  sous,  count  them; 
tell  me  how  many  there  are."  Some  children,  without  counting, 
answer  immediately  any  number  whatever;  whether  this  answer 
is  right  or  wrong,  it  is  not  taken  into  consideration,  as  the  right 
answer  might  be  given  by  chance.  We  insist  that  the  child  ac- 
tually count  the  sous  with  his  finger.  The  slightest  error  suffices 
for  considering  that  the  test  is  not  passed. 


1908    SCALE — SIX   YEARS  201 

A  three  year  old  child  cannot  count  four  sous;  at  four  years,  half 
of  the  children  succeed;  at  five  years  only  retarded  children  fail. 
This  is  then  a  test  for  five  years. 

Six  Year  Old  Children 

Right  hand,  left  ear.  Here  is  another  idea  that  has  been  learned, 
one  so  easy  to  acquire  that  when  it  is  lacking  this  lack  is  charac- 
teristic. Ask  the  child,  ''Show  me  your  right  hand,"  and  then 
"Show  me  your  left  ear."  This  is  almost  a  'catch'  question,  for 
by  asking  the  child  to  show  his  right  hand,  he  has  a  tendency  to 
show  his  right  ear. 

Sometimes  the  child  shows  both  hands,  or,  perhaps  with  one 
hand  he  indicates  the  other,  but  the  action  is  so  obscure  that  one 
does  not  know  which  is  the  hand  that  points  out  and  which  the 
hand  that  is  shown.  To  escape  this  difficulty  tell  him  to  hold  up 
his  right  hand. 

According  to  the  manner  of  replying  children  may  be  divided 
into  three  classes:  (1)  There  are  those  who  do  not  know  at  all 
which  is  the  right  and  which  the  left  hand.  They  may  offer  the 
right  one,  because  it  is  the  one  they  naturally  tend  to  show  first; 
then  they  will  touch  the  right  ear.  We  entirely  disregard  those 
of  still  less  comprehension  who  do  not  know  at  all  where  the  ear  is. 
(2)  There  are  those  who  have  some  idea  of  right  and  left,  but  who 
are  not  quite  siu*e  of  it.  They  present  the  right  hand  and  touch  the 
right  ear,  but  correct  themselves  and  touch  the  left  ear.  (3) 
Finally,  there  is  a  third  group  of  children  who  without  hesitation 
or  error  raise  the  right  hand  and  touch  the  left  ear. 

We  consider  children  of  the  last  two  groups  as  having  passed 
the  test ;  those  who  hesitate  and  correct  themselves  as  well  as  those 
who  do  not  hesitate.  But  the  experimenter  must  be  careful  not 
to  give  the  least  suggestion;  that  would  be  too  naive.  It  is  evi- 
dent that  if  one  says  to  the  child,  when  he  touches  his  right  ear, 
"Are  you  sure?"  or,  if  one  merely  seems  to  disapprove  his  ges- 
ture, the  child  may  be  led  to  touch  his  left  ear;  for,  if  it  is  not  the 
right  it  must  be  the  left. 

At  four  years  no  child  shows  his  left  ear;  they  all  show  the  right 
ear.  At  five  years  half  of  the  children  commit  errors.  At  six 
years  there  are  no  mistakes.  It  is,  therefore,  a  test  which  is  of 
great  value  for  classification. 


202  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

Repeating  a  sentence  of  sixteen  syllables.  We  have  already  ex- 
plained how  to  conduct  this  experiment.  Half  of  the  five  year 
old,  and  all  of  the  six  year  old  children  succeed  in  this  test. 

Esthetic  comparison.  It  cannot  be  denied  that  all  young  chil- 
dren have  a  sense  of  the  beautiful,  and  that  this  sense  may  be 
made  evident,  if  a  problem  is  presented  in  a  simple  way,  for  ex- 
ample, by  asking  the  children  to  compare  and  make  a  choice  be- 
tween two  figures,  one  of  which  is  pretty,  and  the  other  ugly;  but 
the  contrast  between  the  two  figures  must  be  very  great.  This 
question  is  very  interesting  from  a  philosophic  point  of  view  and 
one  can  easily  demonstrate  that  there  is  no  faculty  found'  in  the 
adult  which  does  not  already  exist  to  some  degree  in  the  child. 

This  is  our  procedure.  We  use  six  drawings  (fig.  5)  representing 
heads  of  women;  some  are  pretty,  the  others  ugly,  even  deformed: 
we  make  the  comparison  by  presenting  the  faces  two  at  a  time, 
and  say  to  the  child  each  time,  "Which  is  the  prettier  of  these  two 
faces?"  It  is  necessary  that  the  child  should  reply  correctly  three 
times.  Care  has  been  taken  to  place  the  pretty  head  sometimes 
at  the  right,  sometimes  at  the  left,  to  prevent  the  subject  happening 
to  be  right  simply  because  he  has  acquired  the  habit  of  always 
designating  the  figure  on  a  given  side.  One  must  always  be  on 
guard  against  this  automatic  tendency  to  always  follow  the  same 
direction;  it  is  extremely  frequent  among  children. 

At  six  years  children  compare  correctly  the  three  pairs  of 
faces;  at  five  years  they  succeed  very  poorly,  only  half  giving  the 
correct  reply. 

Definition  of  familiar  objects.  Thus  far,  the  verbal  replies  which 
we  have  required  of  our  little  ones  have  been  very  short ;  a  word  or 
two  was  sufficient.  Now  we  are  going  to  ask  them  to  make  a 
sentence,  because  one  can  not  define  an  object  without  using  a 
sentence.  Definition  is  not  only  an  exercise  and  a  test  of  language, 
it  serves  also  to  show  us  what  idea  the  child  has  of  an  object,  the 
manner  in  which  he  conceives  it,  and  the  point  of  view  which  is 
most  important  for  him. 

Ask  the  subject  successively,  "What  is  (1)  a  fork?  (2)  A 
table?  (3)  A  chair?  (4)  A  horse?  (5)  A  mama?"  These  ob- 
jects have  been  chosen  from  among  many  because  we  have  dis- 
covered that  they  lend  themselves  to  a  useful  classification  of  the 
replies. 

It  is  not  so  easy  to  use  this  test  with  very  young  children.     They 


-w^ 


FIG.  5 

203 


204  .  DEVELOPMENT    OF   INTELLIGENCE 

often  reply  with  an  obstinate  silence.  One  may  say  over  and 
over  ''You  know  a  table  very  well,  a  chair;  you  have  often  used  a 
fork,"  and  then  conclude  a  little  rashly  that,  since  they  know 
these  objects,  they  must  be  able  to  define  them.  But  one  does  not 
always  succeed  in  breaking  their  silence.  Some,  indicating  the 
table  near  which  they  are  seated,  answer  "This." 

The  replies  of  the  subjects  could  be  classified  in  a  great  many 
ways,  if  one  were  making  a  study  of  general  psychology.  For  our 
diagnosis,  we  establish  only  three  distinctions. 

1.  Silence,  simple  repetition,  or  designation  by  gesture.  We 
have  just  given  an  example  of  the  latter.  Repetition  is  easily 
understood;  it  consists  in  repeating  the  same  word;  ''What  is  a 
fork?'^  "It  is  a  fork."  From  the  moment  that  the  child  has  hit 
upon  this  manner  of  avoiding  the  whole  difficulty,  one  may  be 
sure  that  he  will  employ  it  for  the  entire  series  of  definitions.  He 
has  found  the  line  of  least  resistance,  and  he  remains  faithful  to  it. 
This  is  no  spirit  of  malice.  The  young  child  believes  that  he  is 
answering  seriously  and  honestly  what  is  asked  of  him  and  is  even 
greatly  satisfied  with  himself.  Do  not  undeceive  him.  With  a 
perfect  optimism,  say  to  him,  "Very  good,"  and  mark  the  result 
as  a  complete  absence  of  repty.  This  result  is  not  extraordinary; 
it  is  met  with  in  other  psychological  experiments,  for  example,  in 
the  association  of  ideas,  some  young  children  and  some  feeble- 
minded ones  are  satisfied  to  repeat  the  stimulus  word. 

2.  Definition  by  use  only.  Example :  Horse,  it  is  to  draw  wagons, 
— it  is  to  run; — it  is  to  sit  on.  The  frequent  recourse  of  the  work- 
ing class  and  small  tradespeople  to  the  horsemeat  market  ex- 
plains why  a  child  gave  us  the  following  reply:  ''A  horse  is  to  eat." 
We  ask  him  if  he  eats  horseflesh,  and  he  repKes,  "Yes." 

Fork.     It  is  to  eat  with;  one  eats  with  it. 

Table.  It  is  to  eat  on;  a  table  is  for  eating,  or,  a  table  is  where 
one  puts  the  dishes;  it  is  there  where  one  eats. 

Chair.     It  is  for  us  to  sit  on;  it  is  to  sit  on;  it  is  a  place  to  sit. 

Mama.  She  cares  for  little  children;  she  is  to  kiss;  she  is  to  go  on 
errands;  she  gets  the  dinner. 

All  these  replies  are  evidently  childish,  not  only  for  their  incor- 
rect form,  for  the  characteristic  "it  is  to,"  but  still  more  for 
their  conciseness,  and  finally  for  the  state  of  mind  which  they  re- 
veal; there  is  nothing  so  exclusively  utilitarian  as  a  child  of  seven 
years. 


1908   SCALE — SIX   YEARS  205 

3.  Definitions  superior  to  use.  These  are  so  varied  in  form  that 
we  could  not  cite  all  the  varieties  encountered.  But  this  is  un- 
necessary, for  the  essential  point  is  not  to  characterize  these  defini- 
tions but  only  to  distinguish  such  as  are  definitions  by  use.  This 
distinction  is  particularly  difficult  in  certain  replies  where  the  sub- 
ject is  concerned  with  the  use  of  the  object,  but  describes  it  in 
terms  less  childish  than  the  preceding.  For  example.  Table;  is  an 
object  which  is  used  to  eat  on;  or,  it  is  an  instrument  for  eating;  it  is 
a  utensil  to  eat  upon;  it  is  a  piece  of  furniture  to  eat  upon.  Horse: 
it  is  an  animal  which  draws  carriages.  Mama:  it  is  a  lady  who 
takes  care  of  the  house;  it  is  a  lady  who  takes  care  of  the  children. 

The  use  of  the  expressions:  "it  is  an  object,  it  is  an  animal,  it  is 
an  instrument,  it  is  a  thing,"  indicates  that  the  definition  is  less 
childish  than  the  preceding.  We  have  also  found  definitions 
learned  at  school  which  are  interesting  for  their  brevity;  a  table, 
it  is  a  thing;  a  horse,  it  is  an  animal;  it  is  a  domestic  animal;  a 
mama,  it  is  a  person,  it  is  a  lady.  In  other  cases  the  children  at- 
tempt a  description  of  the  object;  a  fork,  it  is  a  little  fork  with  four 
points;  a  table,  a  table  is  a  board  with  four  feet;  a  horse  has  four  legs; 
a  horse  runs,  it  bites,  etc.  The  following  series  was  given  by  a  nine 
year  old  child :  A  fork  has  four  feet;  a  table  has  four  feet;  a  chair  has 
four  feet;  a  horse  has  four  paws;  a  mama  has  two  hands  and  two  feet. 
Older  children  think  of  the  nature  and  the  composition  of  the  ob- 
ject: a  fork  is  copper,  a  fork  is  made  of  white  metal,  a  table  is  of 
wood,  a  chair  is  pieces  of  wood  with  straw,  it  is  varnished  wood,  a 
horse  is  meat,  etc.  Another  point  of  view  is  the  grammatical: 
Table  is  feminine  gender,  chair  also,  horse  is  masculine  gender.  It 
is  unnecessary  to  give  examples  of  more  learned  replies,  for  this 
test  belongs  in  our  measuring  scale  to  the  ages  of  seven  and  nine 
years.  The  intellectual  development  of  these  two  ages  is  deter- 
mined according  to  the  type  of  definition  given  by  the  child. 

To  evaluate  these  definitions  one  must  take  account  of  the  char- 
acter presented  by  the  majority  of  them.  We  ask  five  of  each 
child;  note  the  type  which  is  found  in  three  of  them. 

As  early  as  four  years  half  of  the  children  define  by  use  only. 
The  number  increases  a  little  at  five  years,  and  at  six  we  may  say 
that  practically  all  children  give  definitions  of  this  type.  It  is  not 
until  nine  years  as  we  shall  see,  that  the  majority  of  definitions 
given  are  superior  to  use. 

Execution  of  three  simultaneous  commissions.    Among  the  work- 


206  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

ing  classes  children  are  very  early  in  life  sent  on  errands  to  the 
shops  to  buy  milk,  bread,  meat,  and  to  bring  back  a  bottle  of 
wine.  Physicians  who  practice  at  the  clinic  for  backward  chil- 
dren know  that  these  children  are  characterized,  not  by  the  lack 
of  abihty  to  perform  a  single  commission,  but  by  inability  to  per- 
form several  commissions  at  one  time.  The  mothers  themselves 
often  give  information  to  the  physicians  upon  this  interesting 
pecuharity.  Below  is  the  series  of  commissions  we  give  with  the 
accompanying  instructions.  "Do  you  see  this  key?  You  are  to 
put  it  on  the  chair  over  there  (pointing  to  the  chair)  afterwards 
shut  the  door;  afterwards  you  will  see  near  the  door  a  box  which 
is  on  a  chair.  You  will  take  that  box  and  bring  it  to  me.  Now, 
first  the  key  on  the  chair;  then  shut  the  door,  and  then  bring  me 
the  box.  Do  you  understand?  Now  go."  Very  often  children  do 
only  two  out  of  the  three  commissions;  or,  arriving  at  the  door  they 
go  out,  and  close  the  door  behind  them.  Some  are  wholly  satis- 
fied; others  see  they  have  forgotten  something  and  seem  to  be 
trying  to  recall.  To  pass  this  test  the  three  commissions  must  be 
carried  out  spontaneously,  without  the  necessity  of  telling  the  child, 
"Well,  what  next?  Yoii  have  forgotten  something,"  etc.  It  is 
evident  that  one  might  vary  the  nature  of  these  commissions  ac- 
cording to  the  surroundings.  But  one  must  always  take  care 
that  they  are  very  simple  and  easy  to  execute.  The  smallest 
difficulty  may  intimidate  the  child.  If,  for  example,  we  leave  our 
silk  hat  upon  a  chair  we  do  not  use  it  as  an  object  to  be  moved; 
many  a  child  would  not  dare  to  touch  it. 

At  four  years  scarcely  any  child  can  perform  3  commissions; 
at  five  years  one  half  do  them;  at  six  years  all  or  nearly  all  do  them. 

Age.  Ask  the  child  "How  old  are  you?"  Some  remain  silent; 
others  give  exaggerated  ages,  which  are  in  general  much  below  the 
reality;  a  child  of  six  years  will  say  for  example  that  he  is  two  years 
old.  We  have  not  encountered  any  who  give  an  age  greater  than 
their  own;  those  who  are  mistaken  make  themselves  younger  than 
they  are.  It  is  only  at  six  years  that  the  majority  of  children 
know  their  ages.  It  is  not  a  question  here  of  the  date  of  birth,  of 
course. 

Distinction  between  morning  and  afternoon.  The  perception  of 
time  develops  late  in  children;  for  a  long  period  they  confuse  yes- 
terday and  tomorrow.  The  distinction  in  this  test  is  brought  out 
by  the  following  question :  "  Is  this  morning  or  afternoon?"     Some 


1908  SCALE — SEVEN  YEARS  207 

children  reply  at  random;  others  simply  say,  ''Yes;''  it  is  not 
until  the  sixth  year  that  children  know  certainly  whether  it  is 
morning  or  afternoon.  But  it  is  long  before  six  that  the  child 
knows  whether  or  not  he  has  already  taken  his  midday  meal. 

Apropos  of  this  statement  our  readers  no  doubt  will  remark,  as 
they  will  more  than  once  in  going  over  the  tests  that  follow,  that 
children  are  far  less  advanced,  far  less  intelHgent  than  would  have 
been  supposed.  To  which  we  reply  that  a  rapid  examination  such 
as  ours,  which  puzzles  them  a  little  and  obliges  them  to  make  an 
immediate  display  of  their  knowledge,  tends  to  diminish  it. 
Nevertheless,  granting  this  objection,  the  previous  statement 
still  holds.  One  would  expect  and  we  oiu-selves  were  expecting 
more  brilUant  results.  We  should  have  supposed  that  much  be- 
fore the  age  of  six,  children  could  distinguish  between  morning 
and  afternoon.  The  distinction  seems  so  easy!  Recall  that  chil- 
dren of  six  are  the  oldest  pupils  of  the  ''Maternal  School."  Recall 
that  the  program  of  the  "Maternal  School"  prescribes  the  teach- 
ing of  history  and  geography,  "the  principal  divisions  of  the  earth, 
biographies  drawn  from  national  history."  Such  are  the  regula- 
tions for  the  Maternal  Schools  in  the  department  of  the  Seine. 
Is  it  not  somewhat  ridiculous  to  speak  of  national  history  to  chil- 
dren who  are  not  yet  wise  enough  to  distinguish  morning  from 
afternoon? 

Seven  Year  Old  Children 

Unfinished  pictures.  Show  successively  four  figures  (fig.  6)  in 
which  there  is  lacking  the  eye,  the  nose,  the  mouth,  the  arms. 
With  each  picture  ask  the  child,  "What  is  lacking  in  this  picture?" 
Often  the  child  does  not  respond,  or  makes  an  incorrect  reply. 
For  the  first  picture,  which  represents  a  head,  he  will  say,  for  ex- 
ample, it  is  the  neck  which  is  lacking,  or  the  body,  or  the  ear,  or 
perhaps  the  legs,  or  the  feet;  and  once  having  made  this  answer 
he  will  not  fail  to  repeat  it  for  all  the  other  pictures  (automatic 
repetition) .  Strictly  speaking  this  is  correct,  but  it  is  not  what  we 
ask.  We  desire  that  he  notice  the  lack  which  makes  the  figure 
incomplete.  We  consider  the  test  passed  when  three  answers  out 
of  four  are  correct.  At  five  years,  the  answers  are  inadequate; 
at  six,  two-thirds  are  incorrect;  and  at  seven,  the  great  majority 
are  correct. 


FIG.  6 


208 


1908  SCALE — SEVEN  YEARS  209 

Number  of  fingers.  "How  many  fingers  have  you  on  your  right 
hand?''  "How  many  on  your  left  hand?"  "How  many  fingers 
does  that  make  on  both  hands?"  It  is  necessary  that  the  child 
reply  correctly  to  all  three  questions  without  hesitation.  He 
must  reply  at  once  without  stopping  to  think,  without  counting 
his  fingers,  and  if  he  wishes  to  do  so  we  prevent  him.  We  elimi- 
nate therefore  those  who  answer:  4  fingers  for  the  right  hand,  5 
fingers  for  the  left  hand,  and  6  fingers  for  the  two  hands;  5  fingers 
for  the  right,  5  for  the  left,  and  6  in  all.  Or  again  those  who  say 
5  fingers  for  the  right,  5  for  the  left,  but  for  all,  "I  have  not  had 
time  to  count  them."  A  child  knows  how  to  count  at  an  age  when 
he  is  still  ignorant  of  the  number  of  his  fingers. 

A  priori,  we  should  have  thought  that  a  child  of  six  years  would 
have  been  certain  of  the  number  of  fingers.  This  is  an  error. 
Half  of  them  do  not  know  it.  They  do  not  know  it  imtil  seven 
years. 

Copy  of  a  written  model.  The  written  model  is  composed  of 
three  words,  "The  little  Paul,"  with  capital  letters  for  the  first 
and  third  words.  The  copy  must  be  made  with  pen  and  ink 
which  increases  the  difficulty.  The  model  is  put  before  the  child. 
Here  again,  it  may  be  said,  is  a  test  of  instruction.  Certainly,  but 
on  the  other  hand  there  may  be  a  degree  of  defect  in  the  copy 
which  indicates  a  weakness  of  intelligence.  Thus,  some  children 
make  only  zig-zags,  moreover  they  do  not  notice  that  their  at- 
tempts are  unsatisfactory.  Others  imitate  certain  letters,  which 
are  recognizable  in  their  copy.  To  pass  the  test  it  is  necessary 
that  the  words,  "The  little  Paul,"  can  be  read  by  a  person  who  is 
ignorant  of  the  model. 

Copying  a  diamond.  We  devised  this  test  in  an  institution. 
We  were  surprised  to  encounter  imbeciles  who  could  copy  a 
square,  but  who  could  not  succeed  in  copying  a  diamond.  These 
figures  are  not  very  different  as  to  form  but  the  direction  of  the 
lines  in  the  diamond  is  much  more  difficult  to  trace.  We  encoun- 
tered the  same  fact  among  our  school  children  (fig.  7).  At  five 
years  a  child  can  draw  a  square,  but  it  is  not  until  seven  years 
that  he  can  draw  a  diamond;  and  even  at  seven  years  a  fifth  of 
them  fail.  At  six  years  half  of  the  children  fail.  We  give  exam- 
ples of  good  copies  (1,  2,  3)  and  bad  copies  (4,  5,  6)  so  that  every 
one  may  adopt  the  same  standard  as  we. 


210 


DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 


Repetition  of  five  figures.  The  method  has  been  indicated  above. 
A  child  four  years  old  repeats  three  figures;  to  repeat  five  figures 
he  must  be  seven  years  old;  even  then  only  three-fourths  of  the 
children  succeed. 

Description  of  a  picture.  At  three,  four  or  five  years  of  age,  as 
we  have  seen,  one  obtains  only  enumerations;  descriptions  are  quite 
unusual.  At  six  years  a  small  number  of  children,  scarcely  a  sixth, 
attempt  a  description.  At  seven  years  they  have  made  such 
progress  in  language  that  description  has  become  quite  general. 
There  are  very  few  exceptions,  and  this  test  shows  the  enormous 


0 

X 


FIG.  7 


advance  that  has  been  made  in  regard  to  language  between  the 
sixth  and  seventh  year. 

Counting  thirteen  single  sous.  The  number  of  objects  to  be 
counted  increases  the  difiiculty  of  counting  to  such  a  degree,  that 
we  must  wait  until  the  seventh  year  to  find  children  able  to  count 
thirteen  sous. 

The  thirteen  sous  are  placed  near  together  without  covering  one 
another.  We  insist  that  the  subject  count  them  with  his  finger  and 
aloud.  He  must  give  the  right  number,  thu-teen.  Sometimes 
even  this  is  not  sufficient,  when  one  is  convinced  that  this  answer 
has  been  given  as  the  result  of  chance,  or  following  several  errors. 
There  are  three  essentials  to  a  successful  performance:  (1)  That 


1908   SCALE — EIGHT  YEARS  211 

the  subject  knows  how  to  count  to  thirteen,  and  cannot  be  de- 
ceived in  the  enumeration;  for  in  this  counting  every  kind  of  mis- 
take is  possible.  (2)  It  is  necessary  that  the  subject  touch  a  coin 
at  the  same  time  that  he  says  the  nmnber;  for  this  correspondence 
of  the  hand  and  the  speech  is  often  what  is  at  fault.  There  are, 
for  example,  children  who  will  repeat  one  number  and  touch  by 
two  movements  two  different  pieces;  as  a  general  rule  the  hand  is 
swifter  than  the  speech.  (3)  It  is  necessary  that  no  piece  be 
skipped  and  that  none  be  counted  twice.  This  last  error,  which 
can  be  avoided  only  by  using  some  definite  method^  is  sometimes 
committed  even  by  adults.  We  have  seen  six  year  old  children 
who  take  pains  to  separate  each  piece  from  the  others  as  they 
count.  This  is  the  perfection  of  method — ^this  is  a  sign  of  good 
business  heads. 

At  seven  years  no  one  makes  a  mistake.  At  six  years  two-thirds 
of  the  children  fail. 

Giving  the  name  of  four  common  coins.  There  are  nine  coins. 
They  may  be  used  in  two  different  tests;  the  only  test  with  which 
we  are  here  concerned,  consists  in  determining  if  the  child  knows 
the  four  following:  the  5,  10,  and  50  centime  pieces  and  the  5  franc 
piece.  Many  young  children  know  only  the  five  centime  piece; 
they  call  the  rest  a  big  sou,  a  piece,  a  big  piece,  or  similar  expres- 
sions. We  admit  of  no  error  in  this  test.  Hardly  any  child  of 
six  years  knows  these  four  coins.  At  seven  years,  a  large  ma- 
jority know  them.  It  is  the  most  difficult  of  the  tests  for  seven 
years. 

Eight  Year  Old  Children 

Reading  with  two  memories.  This  test  has  for  us  a  very  special 
meaning.  It  serves  as  the  border  line  between  imbecility  and 
moronity.  Those  defectives  who  are  able  to  participate  in  ordi- 
nary social  life  by  communicating  with  their  fellows  through  writ- 
ten language  are  termed  morons.  Therefore,  it  is  by  a  test  of 
reading  that  we  determine  whether  a  defective  child  is  an  imbecile 
or  a  moron. 

Among  normal  children,  this  test  is  of  much  less  importance, 
for  it  is  the  result  of  school  training.  When  an  adult  of  thirty 
years  does  not  know  how  to  read,  one  may,  without  much  fear  of 
being  mistaken,  question  his  intelligence.  When  a  child  of  8,  9, 
10  years  does  not  know  how  to  read,  one  must  suspend  judgment, 


212  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

for  it  may  be  some  prolonged  sickness  or  other  cause  has  prevented 
him  from  going  to  school.  Therefore,  this  test  is  retained  here 
only  under  certain  conditions.  If  we  use  it,  and  if  the  child  reads 
fluently,  it  is  a  sign  of  intelligence;  if  he  is  unable  to  read,  one  must 
investigate  this  lack  of  instruction. 
This  is  what  we  have  the  child  read: 

Three  Houses  Burn 

Chalons-sur-Marne,  September  5th.  Last  night  a  very  large  fire  in 
Chalons  destroyed  three  buildings  in  the  center  of  the  city.  Seventeen 
families  are  without  homes.  The  loss  will  exceed  150,000  francs.  While 
saving  a  child  in  its  cradle,  a  barber's  boy  had  his  hands  seriously  injured. 

The  test  has  a  three-fold  purpose :  To  make  sure  that  the  child 
knows  how  to  read,  to  measure  his  speed  in  reading,  and  to  ascer- 
tain that  he  understands  and  remembers  something  of  what  he 
reads.  It  may  be  that  the  subject  cannot  spell,  or  cannot  read 
the  more  difficult  words  of  the  text ;  in  this  case  interrupt  the  exer- 
cise and  consider  the  test  as  not  passed.  The  speed  of  the  reading 
may  serve  as  a  useful  criterion.  Let  us  cite  a  few  figures.  To 
read  the  above  mentioned  paragraph,  which  consists  of  53  words 
[in  the  French],  children  of  eight  years  take  45  seconds;  at  nine 
years  the  average  time  is  about  40  seconds;  at  ten  years,  29  sec- 
onds; and  at  eleven  years,  25  seconds.  There  is,  therefore,  a 
gain  in  rapidity  up  to  eleven  years;  let  it  be  said  in  passing  that 
these  figures  permit  us  to  estimate  the  child's  knowledge  of  read- 
ing. We  might  have  included  a  test  of  this  kind  in  our  measuring 
scale  of  intelligence,  had  we  not  resolved  to  measure  the  intelli- 
gence independently  of  scholastic  knowledge.  In  any  case,  when 
we  desire  to  measure  the  scholastic  knowledge  of  the  child,  we  can 
employ  the  following  scale : 


Average  rapidity 
for  reading  a  selec- 
tion of  53  words... 


At    8  years;  45  seconds — or  about  one  word 

a  second 
At    9  years;  40  seconds 
At  10  years;  30  seconds 
At  11  years;  25  seconds — or  about  two  words 

a  second. 


Several  observations  are  to  be  made  regarding  the  ability  in 
reading.  First,  the  following  distinctions  are  to  be  made:  spell- 
ing out,  syllabic  reading,  hesitating  reading,  fluent  reading,  ex- 
pressive reading.     This  classification  has  already  been  proposed 


1908    SCALE — EIGHT   YEARS  213 

by  M.  Vaney.^  Thus,  to  read  the  following  sentence:  " I  ate  some 
chocolate  this  morning,"  if  the  child  says  '*I  a-t-e,  ate,  s-o-m-e, 
some,  etc.,"  it  is  reading  by  spelling  out.  If  he  says  ''I  (a  pause) 
ate  (a  pause)  some  (a  pause)  cho  (a  pause)  co  (a  pause)  late,  etc., 
it  is  syllabic  reading.  If  he  says  ''I  ate  (a  pause)  some  chocolate 
(a  pause)  this  morning,"  it  is  hesitating  reading.  To  be  called 
fluent  reading,  the  reader  must  stop  only  at  the  signs  of  punctua- 
tion; while  in  expressive  reading,  one  adds  the  desired  tone  of  the 
voice  to  bring  out  the  sense  of  the  selection. 

Besides  these  degrees,  notice  must  be  taken  of  the  mispro- 
nunciation of  words  which  is  frequent  among  backward  and  re- 
tarded children  and  may  even  be  encountered  in  fluent  reading. 

When  the  subject  has  read  the  selection,  allow  two  or  three  sec- 
onds to  elapse,  withdraw  the  paper,  and  ask  the  following  question, 
"Tell  me  what  you  have  just  read."  Sometimes  one  must  urge 
the  child  a  little;  we  urge  for  ten  seconds — not  any  longer — and 
then  write  word  for  word  what  the  subject  says;  then  count  the 
number  of  memories  which  have  been  expressed,  using  the  follow- 
ing arrangement. 

Each  word  or  expression,  separated  by  dashes,  constitutes  a 
memory. 

Three — houses — burned — Chalons-sur-Marne — September  5th . — A 
very  large  fire — destroyed — last  night — {Three  buildings  at  Chalons), 
situated  in  the  center  of  the  city — seventeen  families — are  without 
shelter — The  loss  will  exceed  150,000  francs — While  saving — a  child 
— in  it's  cradle — a  barber's  boy — seriously — injured — his  hands. 

The  maximum  number  of  memories,  which  however  is  seldom 
attained,  is  nineteen.  We  have  put  into  parenthesis  a  portion 
of  the  test  which  is  simply  repetition. 

Let  us  now  apply  this  calculation. 

A  child,  after  the  reading,  retains  the  following  memories: 
"A — house — burned — A  little  boy — burned — his  hands."  We 
count  this  as  three  correct  memories;  but  ''burned"  his  hands  is 
an  error.     We  count  only  correct  memories. 

Another  example:  ''Three  houses  burned — Seventeen  families 
without  homes — A  barber  had  his  hands  seriously  injured — He 
has  saved  a  baby."     Eleven  correct  memories. 

As  might  be  supposed  there  is  some  relation  between  the  time 

*  We  refer  the  reader  to  our  book  on  Enfants  Anormaux,  p.  80  and  ff., 
where  these  definitions  of  the  degree  of  reading  have  been  developed. 


214  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

consumed  in  the  reading  and  the  number  of  memories  retained  after 
the  reading;  that  is  easily  understood.  The  more  difficulty  one 
has  in  reading,  the  less  attention  can  be  given  to  the  meaning  of 
the  words;  and  consequently  those  who  read  slowly,  because  it  is 
difficult  for  them,  can  remember  very  little  of  what  they  have  read. 
Here  are  the  results  of  our  observation.  The  general  rule  is  that 
anyone  who  succeeds  in  reading  the  text,  however  slowly  he  reads, 
will  retain  at  least  two  memories;  but  in  order  to  be  able  to  retain 
six  memories,  he  must  be  able  to  read  it  in  less  than  one  minute. 

Certain  errors  must  be  noted,  which  are  quite  important  for  a 
diagnosis  of  intelligence.  A  subject  who  thinks  he  can  read  and 
who  pronounces  meaningless  words  for  the  space  of  a  minute, 
while  following  the  hues,  gives  a  poor  impression  of  his  intelli- 
gence. Such  cases  are  met  with.  They  must  be  evaluated. 
Possibly  this  is  to  be  attributed  to  the  docility  of  some  timid  one, 
who,  thinking  that  he  must  read  for  us,  reads  as  well  as  he  can. 
Moreover,  we  have  met  a  large  number  of  children,  who  read 
rapidly,  even  fluently,  but  who  mutilate  the  words.  Here  then  lies 
an  interesting  pedagogical  question.  Those  children  have  not 
learned  well  in  the  beginning;  their  reading  is  not  inadequate,  but 
faulty. 

In  conclusion,  let  us  note  that  certain  children,  when  asked  to 
recount  what  they  have  read,  give  entirely  false  memories.  One 
such  for  instance  tells  us  that  the  firemen  were  called;  another 
gave  us  the  following:  "  There  was  a  house  on  fire,  and  also  a  child  in 
his  cradle,  the  house  was  all  burnt,  the  baby  has  his  hands  burnt,  and 
his  father  and  mother  were  dead.'' 

Reading  with  two  memories,  is  rarely  accomplished  by  children 
of  seven  years;  children  of  eight  years  nearly  always  succeed. 

Counting  nine  sous.  {Three  single  and  three  double.y  On  a 
table  prepare  in  advance  a  little  pile  of  money,  three  single  and 
three  double  sous,  side  by  side,  without  covering  each  other. 
Show  them  to  the  subject  and  say  to  him  ''Count  this  money,  and 
tell  me  how  much  there  is."  Some  children  do  not  touch  the 
money.     It  is  then  necessary  to  tell  them  to  handle  and  count  it. 

^Editor's  Note:  The  sou  or  5-centime  piece  is  in  value  the  same  as  our 
cent  and  is  the  same  familiar  coin.  Were  the  old  2-cent  piece  still  in  cir- 
culation, we  could  exactly  duplicate  the  test.  Since  this  is  not  the  case, 
the  best  than  can  be  done  is  to  use  postage  stamps.  They  are  stuck  to  a 
small  card,  in  a  row  as  follows,  1,  1,  1,  2,  2,  2, 


1908    SCALE — EIGHT  YEAES  215 

The  slight  difficulty  of  the  test  consists  in  mixing  the  double  and 
single  sous.  No  error  is  tolerated.  The  slightest  error  renders 
the  test  a  failure,  and  the  child  must  not  be  allowed  to  try  again. 
A  single  necessary  precaution  is  to  arrange  the  money  in  such  a 
way  that  all  the  pieces  are  visible.  The  operation  lasts  from  five 
to  ten  seconds.  If  it  lasts  fifteen  seconds,  the  test  should  not  be 
considered  as  passed.  Children  in  this  test  behave  in  three  dif- 
ferent ways:  (1)  They  count  correctly,  for  example,  in  the  fol- 
lowing manner,  1-2-3-5-7-9;  thus  showing  that  they  add  two  at  a 
time  for  the  double  sous;  (2)  They  count  correctly,  but  for  the 
pieces  of  2  sous  they  do  not  jump  two  figures,  thus,  1,  2,  3,  then 
4  and  5  (for  the  first  double  sous)  ,-6  and  7  (for  the  second  double 
sou)  and  8  and  9  (for  the  third  double  sou) ;  (3)  they  count  the 
double  sous,  as  if  they  were  single  sous.  The  last  case  is  a  failure. 
A  great  majority  of  the  seven  year  old  children  pass  this  test;  all 
cannot  do  it  until  eight  years.  Therefore,  this  is  a  transition  test 
between  the  two  ages. 

Naming  four  colors.    Tests  of  colors  might  be  multiplied. 

We  have  chosen  the  fundamental  colors,  red,  blue,  green  and 
yellow,  ehminating  those  whose  names  are  less  familiar  to  chil- 
dren, for  example,  purple  and  orange.  Our  test  does  not  bear 
on  the  perception  and  distinction  of  the  colors,  but  on  their  names, 
which  is  quite  different.  The  young  child  distinguishes,  recog- 
nizes, and  easily  matches  without  the  least  hesitation  the  most 
delicate  shades  of  color,  and  has  nothing  to  envy  in  the  adult  so 
far  as  his  color  sense  is  concerned;  it  is  the  verbalization  of  his 
color  sense,  if  we  may  so  express  it,  in  which  he  is  defective. 

Prepare  beforehand  a  card  on  which  have  been  pasted  four  col- 
ored papers,  red,  yellow,  blue,  green,  each  measuring  6  by  2  cm. 
(one  must  avoid  showing  too  small  a  surface  of  color).  Point  to 
each  color  and  ask  the  child,  ''What  is  this  color?"  No  error  is 
tolerated.  The  slightest  error  causes  the  test  to  be  a  failure. 
This  lasts  on  the  average  about  six  seconds. 

To  count  from  20  to  0.  This  is  partly  a  test  of  instruction;  one 
must  have  learned  in  order  to  be  able  to  count  backwards.  We 
say  to  the  subject  ''Will  you  count  backwards  from  20  to  0?"  If 
he  does  not  understand,  we  add  "Count  like  this,  20,  19."  Some 
children  cannot  count  in  this  way  and  will  not  try.  Others,  in 
spite  of  the  given  instruction,  stubbornly  insist  upon  counting 
forward,  either  immediately  or  after  having  tried  to  count  back- 


216  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

wards;  they  say,  20,  19,  18,  17,  19,  20,  21,  22,  23,  etc.  Others 
understand  quite  well  how  they  are  to  count,  but  they  succeed 
only  by  employing  a  rather  clever  trick,  consisting  in  counting 
forward  to  find  the  correct  figure,  thus,  having  counted  from  20  to 
15,  they  count  rapidly,  1,  2,  3,  4,  etc.,  until  15,  and  find  14  preced- 
ing 15.  The  trick  may  be  discovered  either  by  hearing  the  child 
murmuring  the  numbers,  or  by  the  length  of  time  elapsing  before 
each  number  is  pronounced.  All  these  repUes  are  failures.  In 
order  for  the  test  to  be  passed,  the  operation  must  not  last  more 
than  20  seconds,  and  there  must  be  not  more  than  one  error  (one 
omission  or  one  inversion). 

Writing  from  dictation.  We  have  considered  copying  in  the 
seven  year  test.  Writing  from  dictation  is  far  more  difficult  than 
copying.  Dictate  the  following  words  ''The  pretty  little  girls." 
The  test  is  passed  when  the  words  are  written  separately,  and  if 
they  are  legible  to  one  who  is  ignorant  of  the  dictation.  Only  a 
third  of  the  children  of  seven  years  can  write  from  dictation;  at 
eight  years  all  succeed. 

Comparing  two  objects  from  memory.  This  is  a  valuable  test, 
for  it  does  not  depend  at  all  on  instruction,  and  brings  into  play 
the  natural  good  sense.  It  consists  in  ascertaining  if  the  child 
can  discover  a  difference  between  two  objects  which  he  remembers; 
for  this  perception  of  difference  in  two  objects  is  in  reality  the 
habitual  and  easiest  result  of  a  comparison.  We  say  to  the  child 
*'You  have  seen  butterflies,  have  you  not?" — "Yes,"  ''You  have 
also  seen  flies?"  "Yes."  "Are  they  alike,  the  butterfly  and  the 
fly?"  "No." — "How  are  they  not  alike?"  These  expressions 
are  not  elegant  in  style,  but  have  the  advantage  of  being  easy  to. 
comprehend.  We  proceed  in  the  same  way  for  the  comparison  of 
wood  and  glass,  paper  and  cardboard.  One  must  always  begin 
by  asking  the  child  if  he  knows  the  objects  in  question,  and  if  he 
thinks  they  are  not  alike.  Then  listen  attentively  to  his  reply  and 
weigh  it  well.  We  consider  as  insufficient  the  repKes  which  con- 
sist in  simply  naming  the  objects.  We  have  asked  in  what  the 
paper  and  the  cardboard  are  not  alike;  if  the  subject  repHes 
"cardboard,"  it  is  clear  that  he  has  not  understood.  Another  bad 
reply,  although  somewhat  better,  "A  fly,  it  is  a  fly.''  Most  com- 
monly, the  difference  noted  relates  to  the  size.  A  butterfly  is 
larger,  and  a  fly  is  smaller;  cardboard  is  thicker,  and  the  wood  is 
thicker.     Again    certain    details    are    given.     The    butterfly    has 


1908    SCALE — NINE   YEARS  217 

larger  wings — the  butterfly  has  white  wings — the  butterfly  is  yellow — 
they  have  not  the  same  color — the  fly  is  black,  the  butterfly  is  tri-color 
— it  is  because  the  butterflies  go  on  the  flowers,  and  the  flies  go  on  the 
food — paper  is  soft,  cardboard  is  hard — cardboard  cannot  be  torn — 
wood  does  not  break — it  is  not  transparent — glass  is  used  to  put  in 
the  windows  and  the  wood  is  used  to  make  boards  for  the  floor.  To 
pass  the  test  we  require  that  two  out  of  three  comparisons  be  cor- 
rect. In  order  for  the  comparison  to  be  correct,  the  difference 
must  be  a  true  one.  Thus,  it  often  happens  that  having  found  a 
distinctive  characteristic  in  the  first  comparison,  the  subject  re- 
peats it  for  the  rest;  having  said  that  a  butterfly  is  larger,  he  will 
repeat  the  same  for  the  cardboard  and  the  wood,  which  is  neces- 
sarily an  insufficient  reply.  The  time  required  for  this  operation 
is  often  rather  long,  more  than  one  minute  for  the  three  compar- 
isons; but  if  longer  than  two  minutes  we  consider  that  the  child 
has  failed.  A  third  of  the  six-year-old  children  can  make  these 
comparisons;  nearly  all  seven-year-old  children,  and  all  eight- 
year-old  children  succeed  in  making  them. 

In  conclusion,  let  us  note  that  it  is  difficult  to  distinguish  be- 
tween the  intellectual  level  of  seven  and  of  eight  years;  we  succeed 
in  doing  so  by  using  several  tests  of  instruction,  which  have  been 
introduced  because  they  are  at  the  same  time  of  value  as  tests  of 
intelligence. 

Nine  Year  Old  Children 

Complete  information  regarding  the  date.  The  details  that  we 
require  under  this  head  are  four:  the  day,  the  month,  the  day  of 
the  month,  and  the  year.  And  here  let  us  remark:  we  have  been 
told  that  in  a  certain  Maternal  School  (6cole  Maternelle)  there  is 
a  language  exercise  which  is  given  at  the  beginning  of  the  session, 
bearing  upon  the  teaching  of  the  date.  Children  are  taught  and 
made  to  repeat,  the  day,  the  month,  the  day  of  the  month,  and 
the  year.  However,  not  a  child  in  this  school  was  able  to  give  the 
complete  information  required,  not  even  the  year;  concerning  the 
month,  we  have  had  several  replies:  January,  although  it  was  the 
8th  of  February,  and  that  was  all.  Consulting  our  scale,  one  can 
see  that  this  complete  idea  belongs  to  the  age  of  nine.  It  is  only 
at  nine  years  that  the  great  majority  of  children  possess  it.  This 
unexpected  discovery  leads  to  an  interesting  conclusion  about  pre- 
cocious teaching.     The  aim  of  instruction  should  be  to  follow  the 


218  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

natural  development  of  the  child,  in  hastening  it  a  little;  but  it 
would  be  a  vain  effort  to  precede  it  by  three  or  four  years,  as  is 
ignorantly  done,  in  actual  cases  where  the  attempt  has  been  made 
to  teach  babies  of  five  or  six  years,  what  only  nine  year  old  chil- 
dren can  retain. 

We  consider  the  test  passed  if  the  day  of  the  month  is  within  three 
days  of  the  correct  date.  Indeed  an  intelHgent  person  may  well 
beUeve  that  it  is  the  17th  of  February  when  really  it  is  the  14th; 
but  one  will  rarely  make  a  mistake  for  the  day  of  the  week,  still 
less  for  the  month,  and  never,  unless  it  is  a  case  of  sudden  amne- 
sia, for  the  year.  Curiously  enough,  among  young  children  it  is 
the  indication  of  the  year,  which  is  most  often  lacking.  They  indi- 
cate no  year  at  all,  they  keep  silent — they  do  not  know  it.  For 
them  a  year  is  too  great  a  lapse  of  time,  of  which  they  can  form  no 
idea.  And  moreover,  a  glance  at  the  calendar  will  teach  them  the 
day,  the  month,  the  day  of  the  month — but  not  the  year,  which 
everybody  is  supposed  to  know.  The  calendar  for  the  school- 
room should  display  very  visibly  the  figures  representing  the  year. 

Days  of  the  week.  It  may  be  a  surprise  to  some  that  we  place 
in  the  ninth  year  this  extra-scholastic  acquisition.  Nevertheless, 
it  is  correct.  The  knowledge  of  the  days  of  the  week  belongs  to 
nine  years.  We  ask  the  child  to  recite  them,  and  we  insist  that 
he  recite  them  in  regular  order.  To  this  simple  and  clear  demand, 
the  subject  must  reply  without  hesitation,  without  further  ex- 
planation, and  recite  the  names  of  the  seven  days  of  the  week  in 
their  natural  order  without  great  effort  and  consequently  with 
rapidity.  If  more  than  10  seconds  are  required  for  this  enumera- 
tion count  the  test  a  failure.  We  consider  those  subjects  as 
having  failed,  who  omit  one  day,  who  change  the  order  of  the 
days,  or  who  require  more  than  10  seconds  for  the  repetition. 

Making  change  from  twenty  sous.  This  is  a  test  which  requires 
some  instruction;  nevertheless,  it  has  so  great  a  social  value  that 
we  make  use  of  it.  We  think  it  well  to  give  to  this  test  the  ap- 
pearance of  a  game;  thus  it  is  a  recreation  and  a  rest  for  the  mind. 
On  a  table  there  are  coins  spread  about,  the  nine  coins  of  the  na- 
tional currency  (5,  10,  25,  and  50  centimes  and  1-2-5-10-20  franc 
pieces),  and  little  further  apart  a  sum  of  sixty-five  centimes,  in 
coins  of  the  following  value:  three  ten-centime  pieces,  and  the  rest 
in  five-cenfcime  pieces.  Now,  ask  the  child,  "Will  you  play  store 
with  me?    You  shall  be  the  merchant.'^     Then,  showing  him  the 


1908   SCALE — ^NINE   YEARS  219. 

money,  "This  is  the  cash  drawer,  with  the  money  which  you  will 
use  in  making  change  for  your  customers.  Now,"  showing  him 
some  httle  boxes,  ''this  is  merchandise  which  you  are  to  sell;  they 
are  boxes.  I  will  buy  this  box;  I  shall  pay,  for  example,  four  sous 
for  it.  Is  that  all  right?  Do  you  want  to  play?"  The  subject 
always  consents  and  smiles;  our  offer  pleases  him.  We  give  him 
a  one-franc  piece,  and  say  ''It  is  agreed,  I  buy  this  for  four  sous, 
now  give  me  the  change,"  and  we  extend  our  hand  to  receive  the 
money.  The  only  correct  reply  is  the  following:  the  child  takes 
from  his  change  eighty  centimes  and  gives  them  to  us.  Some- 
times it  happens  that  the  subject  repUes,  "I  owe  you  sixteen  sous" 
and  yet  he  does  not  give  us  back  the  correct  mmaber,  he  gives  us 
15  or  17  for  instance.  This  is  a  failure.  Of  course  we  consider 
as  failures  all  errors  of  a  still  more  serious  nature  such  as  giving  2 
francs  or  4  francs,  etc.  A  ten  year  old  school  child  once  gave  us 
back  thirty-five  francs;  this  was  certainly  an  exception.  In  pass- 
ing let  us  note  how  many  individual  varieties  the  simple  act  of 
making  change  will  bring  out. 

The  quickest  and  cleverest  take  at  once  a  ten-sou  piece,  to 
which  they  add  six  sous.  Sometimes,  hke  true  merchants,  they 
say,  "Four  and  ten  sous  are  fourteen,  and  six  more  are  twenty^* 
Sometimes,  even,  they  count  in  centimes.  They  are  the  virtuosos. 
Others  allow  themselves  to  be  influenced  by  the  13  sous  that  are 
on  the  table;  they  commence  by  gathering  up  all  the  sous  and 
counting  them;  then  they  become  embarrassed  because  they  could 
never  thus  complete  the  necessary  sum;  they  are  obhged  to  begin 
the  calculation  over  again  and  eliminate  a  certain  number  of  sous 
which  they  must  replace  by  a  ten-  or  five-sou  piece.  It  seems 
that  the  most  ignorant  are  attracted  by  the  sous,  which  offer  the 
less  difficulty;  one  must  be  used  to  counting  money,  to  take  at 
once  one  ten-sou  piece,  then  a  five-sou  piece,  and  finally  add  one 
sou.  But  these  different  ways  of  making  change  are  unimportant 
for  our  method.  Is  the  change  given  equal  to  80  centimes?  This 
is  the  whole  matter.  At  the  very  most  when  one  analyzes  the 
results,  one  might  consider  as  slight  the  mistake  of  giving  one  sou 
too  much  or  too  little,  and  as  serious,  an  error  of  five  sous  or  more. 

Few  children  of  seven  years  can  give  the  correct  change  when 
four  sous  are  to  be  taken  from  twenty.  At  eight  years  fully  a  third 
of  them  succeed.    At  nine,  they  all  succeed. 

Definitions  superior  to  use.    This  test  is  explained  above.     At 


220  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

seven  and  at  eight  years,  half  the  children  give  definitions  of  this 
kind.    At  nine  years  all  succeed. 

Reading  with  six  memories.  This  test  has  to  do  with  the  read- 
ing of  the  selection  already  mentioned.  All  children  of  eight 
years  are  able  to  read  aloud,  but  scarcely  one  can  retain  six  mem- 
ories, which  at  that  age  is  very  difficult;  the  mechanics  of  reading 
absorbs  their  attention.  At  nine  years  nearly  all  retain  six 
memories. 

Arrangement  of  weights}^  This  test  is  excellent,  for  it  does  not 
presuppose  any  scholastic  knowledge  or  any  acquired  ideas,  and 
expresses  the  intelligence  in  its  most  natural  form;  but  it  is  a  spe- 
cial sort  of  intelligence,  a  sensorial  intelligence,  in  no  sense  verbal; 
thus  a  street  urchin,  who  is  skillful  in  the  use  of  words  may  easily 
fail  with  the  weights. 

For  this  test  we  use  five  little  pasteboard  boxes,  of  identical 
size  and  color,  so  that  nothing  on  the  outside  permits  the  child  to 
distinguish  one  from  another.  They  are  weighted  with  filings 
wrapped  in  cotton,  and  weigh  respectively  3,  6,  9,  12,  15  grams. 
Each  experimenter  should  construct  his  own  boxes.  For  this,  it 
is  sufficient  to  use  some  letter  scales,  and  five  safety-match  boxes, 
the  weight  of  which  shall  be  graded  by  taking  out  some  matches 
and  replacing  them  with  sous;  in  this  way  one  can  easily  make  for 
himself  five  boxes,  weighing  respectively  6,  9,  12,  15,  18  grams, 
which  may  be  substituted  for  ours. 

The  five  boxes  are  placed  in  a  group  before  the  subject.  Say  to 
him,  ''These  boxes  do  not  all  weigh  the  same.  Some  are  heavy, 
and  some  are  light.  You  are  going  to  place  here  the  heaviest,  and 
beside  it,  the  one  that  is  a  little  less  heavy,  then  here  the  one  a 
little  less  heavy,  and  one  a  little  less  heavy,  and  lastly  here  the 
lightest."  As  we  speak,  indicate  with  the  finger  upon  the  table 
the  place  of  each  box.  We  use  such  simple  expressions,  because 
we  know  that  they  can  be  easily  understood.  The  subject  is 
given  three  trials.  When  he  has  placed  the  boxes  in  order  once, 
break  up  the  order  and  ask  him  to  begin  again.  The  weight  of 
each  box  being  inscribed  on  the  side  resting  on  the  table,  it  is 
easy  to  know  whether  the  subject  has  made  a  mistake  or  not. 
Out  of  three  trials,  two  must  be  absolutely  without  error  for  the 
test  to  be  passed.     Some  children  do  not  understand  our  explana- 

^°  See  p.  62,  1905  scale. 


1908    SCALE — TEN   YEARS  221 

tion  and  remain  motionless;  so  much  the  worse  for  them.  Others 
arrange  the  boxes  at  random,  without  weighing  them,  and  it  is 
easy  to  see  that  they  do  not  compare  them  at  all.  Others  readily 
understand  that  the  heaviest  box  must  be  placed  first,  and  clev- 
erly find  it,  but  are  unable  to  place  the  remaining  boxes  in  a  de- 
creasing order;  the  idea  of  a  decreasing  order  is  not  intelligible  to 
them.  What  is  here  lacking,  is  not  the  appreciation  of  weight, 
but  the  directing  idea.  Lastly  there  are  some  who  grasp  the 
idea  of  a  decreasing  order,  and  who  apply  it  nearly  correctly;  they 
make  a  series  like  the  following:  15,  12,  9,  3,  6,  in  which  only  one 
box  is  misplaced;  they  could  do  better,  but  they  lack  attention 
and  care.  This  is  not  a  very  serious  error;  nevertheless  in  order 
that  the  test  be  passed  we  require  that  two  trials  must  be  entirely 
correct;  the  entire  test  must  not  take  more  than  three  minutes. 

This  test,  as  has  already  been  said,  is  one  of  those  which  best 
denote  the  uncultured  intelligence,  since  it  is  independent  of  any 
instruction.  And  we  also  note  that  the  type  of  intelligence  here 
required  is  of  a  very  special  kind.  There  are  children  otherwise 
very  intelligent  who  do  not  succeed  in  placing  the  boxes  in  order; 
while  others  arrange  them  correctly  and  swiftly. 

Ten  Year  Old  Children 

The  months  of  the  year.  We  are  as  exacting  for  the  recitation  of 
the  months  as  we  are  for  that  of  the  days.  The  subject  should 
recite  them  without  error,  without  transposing  or  omitting  any, 
and  swiftly  enough  so  that  not  more  than  fifteen  seconds  are  re- 
quired; we  permit,  nevertheless,  the  omission  or  inversion  of  one 
month. 

Naming  the  nine  pieces  of  money.  They  are,  as  has  been  said, 
1,  5,  10,  and  50-centime  pieces,  1,  2,  5,  10  and  20-franc  pieces. 

The  main  difficulty  lies  in  distinguishing  the  1  from  the  2-franc 
piece,  also  in  distinguishing  the  10-franc  piece  from  the  20-franc 
piece.  The  coins  are  on  the  table;  we  do  not  handle  them,  but 
we  point  to  them,  and  the  subject  must  name  them  without  touch- 
ing them.  Care  must  be  taken  not  to  allow  the  coins  to  be 
arranged  according  to  value. 

This  is  the  order  which  we  propose:  10  centimes,  2  francs,  10 
francs,  50  centimes,  20  francs,  1  franc,  5  francs,  25  centimes. 
The  coins  must  always  be  shown  with  the  face  up. 


222  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

Children  often  call  the  1-franc  a  2-franc  piece,  and  the  10-franc 
a  20-franc  piece,  and  vice  versa.  These  are  only  slight  errors. 
The  absurdity  consists  in  imagining  new  pieces  of  money,  as  for 
example,  a  3-franc  piece,  or  a  piece  of  15  sous.  A  curious 
error  leads  sometimes  to  the  confusion  of  a  10-franc  with  a  5-franc 
piece.  The  time  consumed  in  this  test  must  not  exceed  forty 
seconds.  Sometimes  one  can  imagine  that  the  error  is  only  a  slip 
of  the  tongue;  in  this  case  we  repeat,  after  an  interval  of  several 
minutes,  the  same  experiment.  We  recall  that  once  a  twelve  year 
old  child  correctly  named  all  the  coins  except  the  5-franc  piece 
which  he  called  a  10-franc  piece.  We  said  nothing,  but  several 
minutes  later,  we  again  asked  him  to  name  the  coins  on  the  table; 
he  made  the  same  error,  and  consequently  we  considered  that  he 
had  failed  in  the  test.  We  note  this  fact  as  a  warning  against  re- 
cording the  results  automatically;  there  are  many  cases  where  a 
slip  of  the  tongue  may  be  suspected,  judging  by  the  sum  total  of 
the  replies;  the  test  therefore  has  to  be  repeated  to  make  sure 
whether  it  was  really  a  slip,  or  not.  In  other  words,  in  spite  of 
the  system  of  annotation  which  we  have  devised,  we  think  it  the 

Euty  of  the  experimenter  to  judge,  weigh  and  examine  the  replies. 
>ur  method  is  not  an  automatic  weighing  machine  like  those  in 
railway  stations,  which  register  automatically  the  weight  of  a 
person,  without  his  intervention  or  assistance. 

Using  three  words  in  one  sentence}^  This  is  the  first  time  that 
we  require  the  subject  to  invent  anything.  This  one  is  verbal. 
It  supposes  that  the  child  knows  how  to  speak  and  write,  and 
knows  the  meaning  of  the  words  "a  sentence." 

We  write  on  a  sheet  of  paper,  the  following  words,  ^' Paris , 
fortune,  stream, ^^  and  read  the  words  aloud  to  the  subject  several 
times  and  say  to  him,  ''Make  a  sentence  in  which  these  three 
words  will  be  found."  Then,  hand  the  pen  to  the  subject.  Some 
will  declare  that  they  do  not  understand.  Often  it  is  the  expres- 
sion "  Make  a  sentence''  which  has  no  meaning  for  them.  No  other 
explanation  is  to  be  given,  but  the  instruction  already  given  may 
be  repeated.  Others  understand,  but  are  not  able  to  invent  a 
sentence  of  any  kind,  or  at  least  one  that  satisfies  them.  As  the 
latter  may  be  too  exacting,  therefore  we  insist  that  they  write 
some  sort  of  a  sentence.  The  answers  given  by  those  who  at- 
tempt the  invention,  may  be  divided  into  three  groups. 

"  See  p.  65,  1905  scale. 


1908  SCALE — TEN  YEARS  223 

1.  Sentences  which  contain  three  distinct  ideas.  Examples: 
'^ Paris  is  a  city,  a  person  has  a  fortune,  the  streams  flows, '^  ''Paris 
is  a  small  city;  a  fortune  is  a  great  many  sous;  a  stream  is  a  little 
river  flowing  along  the  sidewalk  J  ^'^'^ 

2.  Sentences  which  contain  two  ideas.  Example:  "In  Paris 
there  are  gutters  and  men  have  great  fortunes  J'  "Paris  has  gutters 
and  a  fortune." 

3.  Sentences  which  contain  only  one  idea.  Example:  "The 
Seine  is  a  stream  which  makes  the  fortune  of  Paris."  "In  Paris 
I  found  a  fortune  in  the  gutter."  ''A  drunkard  without  a  fortune 
has  been  found  in  the  gutter  in  Paris." 

Beside  these  three  types  of  unified  sentences  may  be  ranged 
another  type,  where  the  sentences  are  numerous  but  well  coordi- 
nated. "I  am  in  Paris;  in  our  street  there  is  a  gutter  which  empties 
its  water  into  the  sewer;  not  very  far  from  my  father's  home  I  know  a 
man  who  has  a  large  fortune."  "I  went  to  Paris  when  I  was  young; 
I  dragged  in  the  gutters  for  a  month;  a  man  took  pity  on  me,  took  me 
to  his  home,  and  at  his  death,  I  inherited  his  fortune." 

Various  stages  in  the  intellectual  development  of  the  child 
are  disclosed  by  these  replies.  For  our  purpose  we  retain  only 
the  last  two:  the  three  words  in  two  sentences,  and  the  three  words 
in  a  single  sentence.  The  first  test,  the  three  words  in  two  sen- 
tences, has  never  succeeded  with  children  of  seven  years;  at  that 
age  they  do  not  write  well  enough.  At  eight  years  almost  none 
pass  the  test.  A  third  of  the  children  at  nine  years  and  half  of 
those  at  ten  years  succeed. 

We  allow  a  minute  for  finding  a  sentence.  If  after  one  min- 
ute, the  sentence,  or  at  least  three-quarters  of  it,  is  not  written,  the 
test  is  a  failure.  Note  that  this  test  is  one  of  the  rare  ones  in 
which  one  child  may  give  help  to  another;  we  have  met  with  cases 
of  it. 

Another  remark.  We  have  said,  apropos  of  the  picture  test, 
that  a  distinction  must  be  made  between  the  intellectual  level  and 
the  judgment  of  a  child,  and  we  have  cited  the  example  of  an  adult 
belonging  to  an  advanced  mental  level,  who  was  able  to  interpret 
the  picture,  but  who  was  guilty  of  absurdities  in  his  interpreta- 

12  The  French  "ruisseau'*  (stream)  is  applied  both  to  the  river  and  to 
the  water  flowing  in  the  street,  gutter,  and  by  metonymy  to  the  gutter  it- 
self; all  the  children  seem  to  have  understood  it  in  the  latter  sense,  hence 
their  change  of  the  word  stream  into  gutter. — ^Ed. 


224  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

tion.  Perhaps  our  distinction  between  the  judgment  and  intel- 
lectual level  may  seem  too  subtle,  but  we  think  not.  We  find  it 
again  in  this  test.  Thus  there  are  children  able  to  use  the  three 
words  in  one  sentence,  but  they  form  a  sentence  without  sense, 
and  they  do  not  perceive  that  it  is  unintelligible.  Examples: 
^^ Paris  is  a  city  of  fortune  by  the  gutter s,^^  "In  Paris,  when  there 
are  gutters,  she  makes  a  fortune.' '  "Paris  is  a  great  fortune,  which 
has  a  great  river.'' 

These  sentences  satisfy  the  requirements  of  our  test,  and  show 
that  the  child  has  attained  the  level  of  the  eleventh  year,  but  they 
prove  the  weakness  of  his  judgment.  Further  investigations  will 
undoubtedly  teach  us  the  importance  that  must  be  attributed  to 
these  facts. 

Comprehension  questions^^  (first  series).  We  give  the  text  of  the 
questions  and  some  examples  of  replies,  good  and  bad. 

1.  "When  one  has  missed  the  train  what  must  one  do?"  Good 
repHes,  ''Wait  for  another  train.  Take  the  next  train."  Bad  answers, 
"  Try  not  to  miss  it  another  time.  Run  after  it.  Go  home.  Buy  a 
ticket." 

2.  "When  one  has  been  struck  by  a  playmate  who  did  not  mean  to 
do  it  what  must  one  do?"  Good  replies,  "Do  nothing  to  him.  Ex- 
cuse him.  Pardon  him.  Tell  him  to  pay  attention  another  time." 
Bad  replies,  which  show  that  the  reservation,  "he  did  not  mean 
to  do  it"  has  not  been  understood,  "Go  tell  the  teacher.  Get 
revenge .     Punish  him . ' ' 

3.  "When  one  breaks  something  belonging  to  another  what  must 
one  do?"  Good  answers,  "Pay  for  it.  Excuse  one's  self.  Replace 
it.  Acknowledge  it."  Bad  replies,  as  a  rule  unintelligible.  ''  You 
must  get  it  paid  for.    Fd  cry.     Go  to  the  policeman." 

Our  three  questions,  as  may  be  noticed,  are  easy  to  understand 
and  present  no  difficulty  of  vocabulary.  Therefore,  it  may  hap- 
pen that  even  six  year  old  children  will  answer  them  satisfactorily, 
but  this  is  rare.  Half  of  the  seven  and  eight  year  old  children 
answer  acceptably;  at  nine  years  three-fourths,  and  at  ten  years 
all  children  do  so.  To  pass  the  test  we  require  that  two  ques- 
tions out  of  three  be  satisfactorily  answered. 

Comprehension  questions  (second  series).  Of  the  same  type  as 
the  preceding,  but  more  subtle,  and  presenting  some  difficulties  of 
vocabulary. 

"  See  p.  65,  1905  scale. 


1908    SCALE — TEN   YEARS  225 

1.  ^'When  one  is  in  danger  of  being  late  for  school,  what  must  one 
dof^'  Good  answers,  "I  must  hurry  up,  I  must  run."  The  bad 
replies  often  contain  an  absurdity.  The  children  have  often  re- 
plied as  if  they  had  understood,  "What  will  happen?"  they  say, 
"TTe  are  punished,  we  are  stood  in  a  corner,'^  ''the  teacher  would 
strike  me."  Or  they  look  into  the  future,  and  try  to  see  how  they 
could  avoid  a  recurrence  of  the  situation.  "We  must  not  doit 
again.  We  must  start  from  home  earlier."  There  is  another  ab- 
surdity still  more  subtle  which  is  sometimes  given.  Our  question 
means  this:  If  one  is  already  later  than  he  ought  to  be,  how  can 
the  lateness  be  diminished?  That  is  the  real  thought.  But,  in- 
stead of  this,  some  children,  mistaking  the  meaning  of  the  ques- 
tion, have  understood  that  they  should  tell  how  they  can  adapt 
themselves  to  the  consequences  of  being  late.  They  answered, 
"We  must  ring"  (The  school  door  being  closed,  those  that  come 
late  must  ring).     "  We  must  bring  an  excuse  from  our  parents." 

For  our  purpose,  only  answers  of  the  first  kind  are  acceptable. 
''We  must  hurry  up." 

2.  "Before  deciding  an  important  affair,  what  must  one  dof" 
Good  replies,  " Study  the  matter.  Reflect.  Ask  advice."  The  bad 
replies  have  but  little  sense,  the  subject,  as  a  rule,  not  under- 
standing the  idiom,  "prendre  parti."  "One  must  care  for  the 
sick.     One  must  consult  the  doctor.    One  must  go  away." 

3.  "  Why  does  one  forgive  a  wrong  action  committed  in  anger  more 
easily  than  a  wrong  action  committed  without  anger f"  Good  an- 
swers, "Because  when  one  is  angry,  he  does  not  do  it  purposely. 
In  anger  one  is  not  responsible.  In  anger  one  does  not  know  what 
one  does." 

Finally  the  bad  answers  result  from  a  total  lack  of  comprehen- 
sion of  the  question,  or  because  the  word  "anger"  has  acted  on 
the  child  as  a  suggestion  and  because  the  child  disapproves  the 
fact  of  being  angry.  "When  one  is  angry,  one  does  not  want  to 
listen."     "One  must  not  get  angry." 

This  question  is  the  most  difficult  of  all;  and  it  may  happen  that 
the  child  understands  it  but  cannot  express  his  thought.  That  is 
a  small  matter;  we  must  weigh  and  discover  the  idea  that  anger 
constitutes  an  excuse. 

4'  "If  someone  asks  your  opinion  of  a  person  whom  you  know 
but  little  what  must  one  dof"  Good  answers,  "One  must  say 
nothing.    One  must  not  talk  without  knowledge.    One  must  say 


226  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

nothing  for  fear  of  giving  wrong  information.''  The  bad  answers 
are  mostly  unintelligible,  ''One  must  ask.  One  must  answer.  We 
say  to  him,  behave.     We  say  that  we  do  not  know  his  name." 

5.  "  Why  must  we  judge  a  person  by  his  acts  rather  than  by  his 
words?''  Good  replies,  "Because  words  may  lie,  but  acts  are  true. 
Because  one  is  surer  in  seeing  the  acts  than  in  hearing  the  words." 
Bad  replies,  often  unintelligible,  "One  must  not  lie.  Because  one 
does  not  know." 

In  the  preceding  tests,  one  sometimes  meets  with  children  who 
remain  silent,  and  the  difficulty  is  to  know  the  cause  of  this  silence. 
Perhaps  the  child  has  no  answer,  or  a  poor  answer,  which  does  not 
satisfy  him.  The  experimenter  is  often  at  a  loss  and  only  from 
the  sum  total  of  the  replies  can  he  correctly  judge  each  special 
case.  He  must  have  the  patience  to  allow  the  child  twenty 
seconds  reflection  before  answering.  Two  poor  answers  out  of 
five  are  allowed. 

Children  seven  or  eight  years  old  do  not  give  good  answers  to 
the  majority  of  the  questions  in  the  second  series;  only  half  of  the 
ten  year  old  children  answer  correctly.  This  test  is  therefore 
transitional  between  ten  and  eleven  years. 

In  general,  this  test  is  one  that  best  expresses  the  common  notion 
of  intelligence.  Sometimes  one  hesitates  about  the  diagnosis  of  a 
child.  He  fails  in  one  or  two  tests  which  scarcely  seem  conclusive. 
Not  to  know  the  date,  not  to  be  able  to  recite  the  series  of  months, 
might  be  excusable  errors  which  it  is  permissible  to  ascribe  either 
to  a  lack  of  attention  or  of  training.  But  the  questions  of  com- 
prehension dispel  all  doubt.  We  recall  that  several  times  teachers 
have  asked  us  to  decide  if  such  or  such  a  child  was  not  subnormal ; 
sometimes  even  they  were  trying  to  trap  us;  but  we  are  not  at  all 
adverse  to  being  put  to  the  test  ourselves;  it  is  quite  fair.  Our 
questions  of  comprehension  enlighten  us  at  once.  We  remember  in 
particular  a  child  very  slow  to  answer,  apparently  half  asleep,  who 
made  a  poor  impression  because  of  his  expressionless  face,  who  did 
not  know  the  day  of  the  week,  nor  what  day  came  after  Sunday, 
although  he  was  ten  and  a  half  years  old;  he  could  read  only  by 
syllables.  But  when  we  asked  the  fifth  question,  "Why  must  we 
judge  a  person  by  his  acts  rather  than  by  his  words?"  he  gave  imme- 
diately the  following  answer,  "Because  words  are  not  very  sure,  and 
acts  are  more  sure."  That  was  sufficient.  We  were  enlightened; 
that  child  was  not  so  stupid  as  he  looked. 


1908  scale — eleven  years  227 

Eleven  Year  Old  Children 

Criticism  of  sentences.  This  test  is  not  the  one  we  had  at  first 
devised.  Our  aim  was  to  test  the  judgment  of  the  child;  and  in 
order  to  succeed  we  followed  the  method  of  certain  foreign  alien- 
ists, by  giving  some  absurdities,  to  see  if  we  could  make  the  child 
agree  with  us.  Example  of  absurd  questions  which  we  at  first 
employed : 

"When  two  men  quarrel,  why  is  there  often  near  them  a  yellow 
dog?"  "When  a  man  plays  marbles,  why  is  he  often  decorated?'^ 
German  alienists  used  to  put  such  questions  as  this  to  the  insane, 
"Is  snow  red  or  black?'* 

Experience  has  shown  us  that  although  very  dull  children  accept 
these  absurdities,  even  looking  for  and  finding  a  reply  to  our 
ridiculous  questions,  other  very  intelligent  children  sometimes  fall 
into  the  trap. 

We  have  reached  the  conclusion  that  the  acceptance  of  an  absurd 
sentence  does  not  depend  solely  upon  the  weakness  of  the  child's 
judgment;  timidity,  difl&dence,  confidence,  automatism,  each 
plays  its  part.  We  recall  having  dictated  om*  absurd  sentences, 
mixed  with  others  which  were  not  absurd,  to  a  class  of  backward 
children  in  Salpetriere;  imbeciles  and  morons  were  not  wanting 
in  this  class  of  pupils,  but  there  were  about  fifteen  children  who 
could  reply  in  writing.  This  constituted  a  crowd,  and  a  crowd  is 
neither  timid  nor  deferential.  Every  time  that  we  pronounced 
one  of  our  absurd  "Whys,"  there  was  an  explosion  of  ironical 
laughter  from  the  whole  group  of  pupils.  The  morons  under- 
stood therefore  the  nonsense  of  our  questions,  and  not  feeling 
obliged  to  show  any  deference  to  us,  expressed  their  feelings 
noisily.  All  these  reasons  induced  us  to  change  the  form  of  our 
test.  Now  instead  of  imposing  an  absurdity,  we  warn  the  child 
that  there  will  be  one,  and  we  ask  him  to  discover  and  refute  it ; 
in  this  way  no  feeling  of  reserve,  of  timidity  or  of  deference,  if 
he  has  any,  paralyses  the  judgment  of  the  child.  The  only 
difficulty  for  the  experimenter  is  to  find  out  the  real  meaning  of 
the  child  when  expressed  poorly  in  obscure  sentences.  Very 
often  the  child  has  the  feeling  that  our  affirmation  is  absurd, 
but  does  not  succeed  in  giving  the  reason  for  his  feeling  and 
cannot  translate  it  into  thought.  To  feel  a  thing  is  not  the  same 
as  expressing  it;  for  in  many  cases  the  child  contents  himself 


228  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

with  repeating  the  same  sentence  or  the  part  of  the  sentence 
which  contains  the  absurdity  without  other  comment  than  his 
insistence  upon  that  part  of  the  sentence,  or  his  air  of  disappro- 
bation. From  this  could  be  deduced  interesting  analyses  of  our 
method  of  understanding  and  explaining.  We  shall  come  back 
to  this  same  subject  elsewhere. 

For  this  test  we  begin  with  the  following  explanation:  "I  am 
going  to  read  you  some  sentences  in  which  there  is  something 
silly.  Listen  attentively  and  tell  me  every  time  what  there  is 
that  is  silly.''  Then  slowly,  very  slowly,  with  a  serious  tone,  we 
read  one  sentence,  and  immediately,  changing  our  tone,  we  ask, 
''What  is  silly  in  this  sentence?"  This  experiment  usually 
interests  the  children  by  its  novelty. 

1.  ''An  unfortunate  cyclist  broke  his  head  and  was  instantly 
killed;  they  have  taken  him  to  the  hospital,  and  it  is  greatly  feared 
that  he  cannot  recover.'^  Good  answers,  "Since  he  is  dead,  it  is 
certain  that  he  will  not  recover. "  "If  he  is  dead  he  cannot  recover. " 
"Since  he  is  dead,  he  cannot  be  cared  for.'^  "You  say  that  he  is 
dead,  and  they  take  him  to  the  hospital  and  one  is  afraid  that  he  will 
not  recover.'^  Poor  answers,  "It  is  silly  to  ride  a  bicycle.''  "It 
is  silly  to  recover. "     "Hospital. "     "  There  is  nothing  silly.' ' 

2.  "I  have  three  brothers,  Paul,  Ernest  and  myself."  Good 
answers,  "You  have  only  two  brothers."  "You  are  not  your  own 
brother."  "If  there  are  three  brothers,  there  must  be  three  brothers, 
but  you,  you  do  not  count. "  "  You  ought  to  say:  I  have  two  brothers." 
Poor  answers,  "What  is  silly  is  that  you  say  'myself.'"  "You 
ought  to  give  your  name."  "What  is  silly,  it  is  Ernest."  "What 
is  silly,  it  is  you."     " There  is  nothing  silly ." 

8.  "  Yesterday  they  found  on  the  fortification  the  body  of  an  un- 
fortunate girl,  cut  into  eighteen  pieces.  It  is  believed  that  she  killed 
herself."  Good  answers,  "One  cannot  cut  himself  into  eighteen 
pieces."  "If  she  cut  an  arm,  she  could  not  then  cut  anything  else. " 
Poor  answers,  "What  is  silly,  it  is  to  kill  one's  self."  "What  z> 
silly,  it  is  eighteen  pieces."  "It  cannot  be  found  out  if  she  killed 
herself. "  "  There  is  nothing  silly. "  "It  is  because  it  is  not  true. " 
"If  she  had  nothing  at  home  to  cut  herself  with. " 

4.  "  Yesterday  there  was  a  railroad  accident,  but  it  was  not  serious; 
the  number  killed  is  only  forty-eight."  Good  answers,  "It  is 
very  serious  when  there  are  forty-eight  killed, — it  is  many."  "It 
is  not  serious,  and  the  number  of  dead  is  forty-eight! ' '     Poor  answers. 


1908    SCALE — ELEVEN*   YEARS  229 

^^Forty-eight  dead.  There  is  nothing  silly.  ^^  "It  is  that  there  was 
nobody  killed. ''     "One  could  say  many  corpses.'' 

5.  "Somebody  used  to  say:  If  in  a  moment  of  despair  I  should 
commit  suicide,  I  should  not  choose  Friday ,  because  Friday  is  an 
unlucky  day  and  it  would  bring  me  ill  luck.''  Good  answers, 
"Since  he  kills  himself,  it  does  not  matter  that  it  be  a  Friday  or 
another  day."  "It  does  not  matter  as  long  as  he  kills  himself, 
if  he  kills  himself  on  Friday. "  "Friday  cannot  bring  him  bad  luck. 
He  can  as  well  kill  himself  Friday  as  Saturday,  it  does  not  matter. " 
Poor  answers,  "Friday  is  like  any  other  day,  it  does  not  bring  bad 
luck."  "Friday  is  not  a  day  worse  than  any  other."  "What  is 
silly,  is  to  kill  one's  self."  "What  is  silly,  is  bad  luck."  "It  is 
Friday."  "There  is  nothing  silly."  "One  must  not  be  super- 
stitious. "     "  Because  we  don't  know  it. " 

These  five  sentences  are  employed  to  test  the  critical  sense. 
To  call  the  test  successful  we  require  that  at  least  three  of  the 
sentences  receive  a  good  reply.  This  test  lasts  about  2  minutes. 
It  is  one  of  those  which  best  shows  the  intelligence  of  a  child. 
At  nine  years  almost  no  one  succeeds;  at  ten  years  scarcely  one- 
fourth,  at  eleven  years,  one-half. 

Three  words  in  a  sentence.  The  explanation  of  this  test  will  be 
found  above.i^  Every  one  succeeds  at  eleven  years;  scarcely 
one-fourth  at  ten  years. 

Sixty  words  in  three  minutes.  The  subject  is  told  to  cite  in  3 
minutes  the  greatest  number  of  words  possible,  such  as  table, 
beard,  shirt,  carriage,  etc.  Arouse  his  emulation  by  telling  him 
that  some  of  his  comrades  are  able  to  say  more  than  200  words 
in  3  minutes,  which  is  true.  This  test  is  very  interesting,  for  it 
furnishes  a  rich  field  for  observation ;  besides  the  nimaber  of  words, 
one  may  note  their  association.  Some  subjects  say  only  detached 
words,  each  of  which  demands  an  effort  of  invention.  Others 
make  series,  series  of  school-room  furniture,  series  of  articles  of 
clothing,  geological  series,  etc.  Some  use  only  the  common 
nouns,  names  of  objects,  others  give  abstract  qualities,  or  words 
somewhat  unusual.  All  this  gives  an  idea  of  the  mentality  of  the 
subject.  To  employ  a  series,  to  give  abstract  words,  are  good 
signs  of  intelligence  and  of  culture.  But  here  we  consider  only 
the  number  of  words.     In  3  minutes  one  should  have  time  to  cite 

"Page  222. 


230  DEVELOPMENT    OF   INTELLIGENCE 

at  least  200  words  without  hurrjdng,  if  he  does  not  have  to  search 
for  them.  However  he  must  search,  and  everyone  has  not  the 
same  power  of  evocation.  Young  children  exhaust  at  once  the 
directing  idea;  they  say,  for  example,  ''hat"  then  they  pass  to 
another  object  without  considering  that  hats  have  different  colors, 
shapes,  parts,  uses,  connections,  and  that  in  mentioning  all  these 
one  would  find  a  large  number  of  words.  There  is  among  them 
lack  of  skill  in  the  use  of  language  or  in  the  analysis  of  ideas,  which 
is  very  striking.  One  sees  children  of  ten  years  who  wait  some- 
times 30  seconds  searching  for  words  and  finding  none.  This  test 
allows  one  to  appreciate,  in  accord  with  the  observations  we  have 
made  elsewhere,  the  intellectual  activity  of  a  person,  as  well  as  his 
verbal  type.  Those  who  have  many  words  at  their  service,  those 
who  think  in  words,  who  have  acquired  the  use  of  abstract  ideas 
or  who  delight  in  making  puns,  seem  to  us  to  have  an  advantage 
over  the  others.  The  test  is  not  passed  unless  a  minimum  of  60 
words  is  found.  At  eleven  years,  all  children  succeed;  they  find 
sometimes  a  considerable  number  of  words,  150,  200;  one  child 
gave  218. 

Abstract  definitions.  For  definitions  three  abstract  words  are 
given,  charity,  justice,  and  goodness.  The  formula  employed  is 
very  simple :  What  is ? 

Charity.  A  good  definition  ought  to  contain  two  ideas — ^the 
idea  of  unfortunate  people  and  the  good  that  one  does  them. 
Good  answers,  "It  is  the  act  when  one  helps  people  in  trouble.'* 
''It  is  to  give  money  to  old  people  who  are  not  able  to  work. "  ''It 
is  to  give  alms,*'  "Charity  is  when  one  sees  a  poor  man,  has  pity 
on  him,  and  if  one  has  some  sous  gives  them  to  him. "  Poor  answers, 
"It  is  to  be  good.''  "It  is  to  be  charitable."  "It  is  to  ask.'' 
" It  is  a  person  who  is  good."  "It  is  when  one  is  poor."  "It  is 
to  ask  pardon." 

Justice.  A  good  definition  contains  the  idea  of  law,  that  is  to 
say,  a  rule,  of  the  protection  accorded  to  persons  and  to  interests, 
or  the  idea  of  persons  treated  according  to  their  merits.  Good 
answers,  "Justice  is  an  act  which  consists  in  judging  persons 
who  are  guilty,  and  releasing  persons  who  are  innocent."  "It  is 
a  law  which  commands."  "Justice  is  to  punish  the  wicked  even 
if  they  are  rich."  Poor  answers,  "Justice  is  the  one  who  judges." 
"Justice  is  a  judgment."  "Justice  is  to  judge."  "It  is  where 
one  judges."     "It  is  to  cut  the  throat."     "It  is  some  agents." 


1908   SCALE — ELEVEN*   YEARS  231 

Goodness.  A  good  definition  should  express  the  idea  of  affec- 
tionate feehng,  of  tenderness,  or  simply  of  acts  of  assistance, 
without  implying  the  idea  of  inequality  of  condition  between 
the  one  who  gives  and  the  one  who  receives.  Good  definitions, 
"Goodness  is  to  he  kind  to  others.''  "Goodness  is  an  act  which 
consists  in  waiting  when  a  person  is  not  able  to  pay,  and  in  not 
striking  others.'*  "It  is  to  give  good  for  evil."  "Goodness  is  to 
share  with  others."  Poor  definitions,  "Goodness  is  to  he  good." 
"One  must  do  something  good."  "To  he  good,  it  is  to  he  well 
dressed."  "It  is  to  take  off  one's  hat."  "Goodness  is  diligence." 
"Goodness  is  dust."     "Goodness  is  to  have  cheek  or  hrass." 

To  pass  the  test  there  must  be  at  least  two  good  definitions. 
This  test  is  sometimes  difficult  to  interpret.  At  eight  and  at 
nine  years,  one  sometimes  finds  children  who  give  good  definitions, 
but  it  is  very  rare.  At  ten  years,  a  third  succeed;  at  eleven  years, 
nearly  all. 

Placing  disarranged  words  in  order.  This  test  was  inspired  by 
the  investigations  of  Ebbinghaus,  who  had  his  pupils  fill  in  blanks 
left  in  sentences  by  the  omission  of  a  word.  We  employ  the 
three  following  groups  which  are  given  to  the  pupil  with  the 
direction:  "Put  these  words  in  order  and  find  the  sentence  which 
they  make.^' 

STARTED  THE  FOR       TO  ASKED  PAPER  A  DEFENDS 

AN  HOUR  EARLY  MY  I  TEACHER  DOG  GOOD  HIS 

WE  COUNTRY  AT  CORRECT  THE  MASTER  BRAVELY 

Solutions.  1.  We  started  for  the  country  at  an  early  hour  or 
At  an  early  hour  we  started  for  the  country.  Poor  answer,  "We 
started  country 

2.  "I  asked  the  teacher  to  correct  my  paper." 

3.  "A  good  dog  bravely  defends  his  master."  A  variation  less 
exact  is  "A  dog  defends  his  good  master  bravely."  Poor  vari- 
ations: "A  master  defends  his  good  dog  bravely."  "A  dog  de- 
fends his  master  bravely  good." 

It  is  a  puzzle  which  interests  many.  There  are  large  individual 
differences  in  the  rapidity  with  which  the  solution  is  found.  Some 
need  only  five  seconds;  others  need  twenty  seconds,  sometimes 
even  fifty.  The  time  limit  is  one  minute  for  each  sentence.  In 
order  to  pass  the  test  it  is  necessary  that  two  out  of  three  sentences 
be  correct. 

Many  children  do  not  understand  the  instruction  given,  and 


232  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

invent  words  or  make  a  sentence  having  no  connection  with  what 
is  written.  For  instance  one  child  made  the  following  sentence, 
''The  short  dog."  "I  defend  my  country."  " I  have  bought  some 
candy. " 

Twelve  Year  Old  Children 

Repetition  of  seven  figures.  This  test  is  made  in  the  same  manner 
as  for  5  figures.  One  warns  the  subject  in  advance  that  he  is 
going  to  have  7  figures  to  repeat.  Three  trials  are  given;  one 
success  is  sufl&cient. 

Rhymes. ^^  Begin  by  asking  the  subject  if  he  knows  what  the 
word  rhyme  means.  Whether  he  knows  or  not  (and  very  often 
he  thinks  he  knows  when  he  does  not),  give  him  the  following 
explanation.  ''Two  words  which  rhyme  are  two  words  which 
have  the  same  ending.  Thus  '  grenouille '  rhymes  with  '  citrou- 
ilW  by  the  ending  in  'ouille.'  In  the  same  way  'mouton* 
rhymes  with  hdton,  both  ending  in  ton.  Do  you  understand? 
I  am  going  to  give  you  a  word  and  then  you  must  find  other 
words  which  rhyme  with  it.  It  is  the  word  '  oheissance.'  Find 
me  all  the  words  which  rhyme  with  '  oheissance.^  "  A  minute  is 
allowed  for  the  search  and  during  that  period  of  time  the  pupil 
is  required  to  find  three  rhymes.  Stimulate  but  do  not  aid  him. 
Generally  he  begins  by  reciting  the  word  '' desobeissance." 
Sometimes  he  gives  a  series  of  words  which  do  not  rhyme.  Others 
coin  words  as  fance,  niance,  servance,  etc.,  or  they  give  words 
which  do  not  end  in  "ance"  and  are  unknown;  rirement,  mique- 
ment.  Finally  some  children  having  understood  nothing  repeat 
''grenouille,"  citrouille."  While  others  differently  oriented  say, 
obeir,  fobeis,  je  desobeis,  or  again  "punition,  mechancete. "  Certain 
ones  cite  varied  examples  of  disobedience,  "To  steal  things  from 
one's  comrades,  to  give  kicks,  etc. "  This  test  is  one  of  the  easiest 
to  measure. 

Repetition  of  a  sentence  of  twenty-six  syllables.  We  have  com- 
posed a  series  of  22  sentences  each  formed  of  words  easy  to  under- 
stand and  which  are  of  increasing  length;  the  first  of  these  sen- 
tences has  24  syllables;  the  last  has  44.  One  is  able  by  this  proc- 
ess to  determine  very  easily  the  subject's  power  of  verbal 
repetition.  There  are  certain  effects  always  to  be  observed  when 
one  proceeds  by  an  increasing  order;  certain  sentences  are  repro- 
duced exactly;  then  in  proportion  as  the  sentences  are  lengthened, 

"  See  p.  63,  1905  scale. 


1908   SCALE — TWELVE   YEARS  233 

slight,  insignificant  changes  are  made  in  reproducing  them;  a 
word  is  misplaced,  a  non-essential  word  is  forgotten  or  even 
replaced  by  a  synonym.  These  slight  alterations  are  produced 
within  a  limit  corresponding  to  an  increase  of  from  6  to  10  syllables. 
Then  serious  omissions  are  made;  an  essential  part  of  a  sentence 
is  forgotten  or  changed.  We  think  it  more  convenient  to  allow 
no  error. 

Let  us  remark  in  passing  that  the  memory  for  verbal  repetition 
does  not  greatly  increase  from  six  to  ten  years,  notwithstanding  the 
immense  intellectual  difference  between  these  two  ages. 

Thus  a  group  of  six  year  old  children  at  the  Maternal 
School  has  given  us  the  following  series  of  maximums  of  repeti- 
tion, 22-18-20-18-20-24.  A  group  of  nine  and  ten  year  old 
children  has  given:  16-22-22-22-22-22-22.  We  had  expected 
a  very  much  greater  difference.  Decidedly,  memory  does  not 
make  great  progress  with  age. 

We  require  that  at  12  years  a  sentence  of  26  syllables  should  be 
repeated  correctly.     Here  are  the  sentences  we  use. 

Twenty-four  syllables.  My  children^  one  must  work  very  hard 
in  order  to  live;  one  must  go  to  school  every  morning. 

Twenty-six  syllables.  The  other  day  I  saw  in  the  street  a  little 
yellow  dog.     Little  Maurice  has  soiled  his  new  apron. 

Twenty-eight  syllables.  Ernest  is  often  punished  for  his  naughty 
conduct.     I  bought  at  the  store  a  pretty  doll  for  my  little  niece. 

Thirty  syllables.  That  night  there  was  a  terrible  storm  of  light- 
ning. My  companion  has  taken  cold,  he  has  a  high  fever  and  he 
coughs  much. 

Thirty-two  syllables.  The  tram  car  is  cheaper  than  the  omnibus^ 
it  costs  but  2  cents.     It  is  droll  to  see  women  driving  coaches  in  Paris. 

Problem  of  various  facts.  Although  a  puzzle,  this  test  demands 
good  sense  rather  than  a  glance  of  the  eye.  We  have  devised 
two  such  tests,  each  of  which  contains  a  problem. 

1.  A  person  who  was  walking  in  the  forest  of  Fontainebleau 
stopped  suddenly,  and  then,  horrified,  ran  to  the  nearest  police 
station  to  report  that  he  had  seen  hanging  from  a  branch  of  a  tree  a 
(after  a  pause).    A  what? 

2.  My  neighbor  has  just  been  receiving  strange  visitors.  He  has 
received  in  turn  a  doctor,  a  lawyer,  and  then  a  priest.  What  is  taking 
place  at  my  neighbor's  house? 

These  two  questions  greatly  arouse  the  curiosity  of  the  pupils. 
To  the  first  they  have  answered,  ''  Someone  robbing  a  bird's  nest, 


234 


DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 


a  snail,  a  thief,  an  assassin,  a  trunk  of  a  tree,  a  hunch  of  grass,  etc. 
The  only  correct  answer  as  the  text  indicates  is  "a  person  hanged.'^ 

For  the  second  question  the  right  answer  is,  ''He  is  very  ill, 
he  is  dying,  etc.'^  Poor  answer:  I  do  not  know.  The  wrong 
answer  often  consists  in  a  repetition  of  the  question,  He  has 
the  doctor  and  priest. 

In  order  to  pass  the  test  it  is  necessary  to  answer  both  questions 
correctly. 

Thieteen  Year  Old  Children 

Paper  cutting.^^  A  sheet  of  paper  folded  in  four  is  presented  to 
the  pupil;  in  the  middle  of  that  edge  which  shows  only  one  fold, 
a  small  triangle,  a  centimeter  in  height,  whose  base  coincides 


FIG.  8 

with  the  edge  of  the  paper,  has  been  drawn,  and  the  pupil  is 
told,  "Here  is  a  sheet  of  paper  which  has  been  folded  in  four; 
suppose  that  here  (one  shows  him  the  triangle)  I  make  a  notch 
with  the  scissors,  and  cut  out  the  little  triangle  of  paper  which  is 
drawn.  Now,  if  I  unfold  the  paper  what  shall  I  see?  Draw  the 
paper,  and  show  in  what  place  and  how  the  hole  will  appear." 
It  is  of  course  forbidden  to  touch  the  paper;  it  is  also  forbidden 
to  try  by  folding  another  paper.  By  the  aid  of  the  imagination 
alone  the  subject  must  be  able  to  represent  the  effect  of  the  cut- 
ting in  the  unfolded  paper.  This  test  is  extremely  difficult. 
Most  subjects  simplify  the  problem  very  much.  They  imagine 
that  there  is  but  one  hole  having  the  shape  of  a  square,  or  of  a 

"  See  p.  67,  1905  scale. 


o 


o 


/i_:. 


1908    SCALE — THIKTEEN   YEARS 


235 


rhombus,  or  sometimes  of  a  five-pointed  star,  occupying  the 
center  of  the  sheet  of  paper.  They  imagine  this  because  the 
notch  was  made  in  the  middle  of  the  edge.  Some  make  two 
rhombuses  in  a  straight  line  each  occupying  the  center  of  half 
the  sheet  of  paper. 

When  a  child  succeeds  in  this  test  at  the  first  attempt,  it  is 
necessary  to  ask  him  if  he  has  seen  it  before. 

Reversed  triangle.  A  visiting  card  is  cut  in  two  pieces  along  its 
diagonal.  It  is  shown  to  the  subject  on  a  sheet  of  paper,  the  two 
parts  in  place  and  touching,  and  he  is  told,  "Look  well  at  the  lower 
part;  suppose  it  to  be  turned  over  and  that  the  edge  AC  (AC  of  the 
figure  is  indicated  by  pointing  ta  it)  is  applied  to  the  edge  AB 


FIG.  9 


of  the  upper  part;  suppose  also  that  the  point  C  is  placed  on  the 
point  B.  Now  I  remove  the  piece;  replace  it  in  your  mind  and 
sketch  its  contour  as  if  it  were  in  place.  Commence  by  tracing 
the  outline  of  the  first  piece. "  This  is  a  very  difficult  test.  In 
order  to  succeed,  the  pupil  must  draw  a  right  angle  at  B,  and  the 
edge  AC  must  not  be  as  long  as  AB.  Very  often  only  one  of 
these  conditions  is  satisfied  by  the  pupil's  sketch. 

Differences.^'^  It  is  asked,  What  difference  is  there  between 

1 .  Pleasure  and  happiness? 

2.  Evolution  and  revolution? 

3.  Event  and  advent? 

4.  Poverty  and  misery? 

5.  Pride  and  pretension? 

"  See  p.  68,  1905  scale. 


236  development  of  intelligence 

General  Conditions  of  the  Examination 

First  the  testing  should  take  place  in  a  quiet  isolated  room. 
The  examiner  should  be  alone  with  the  child  and  when  possible 
he  should  have  a  secretary  whose  duty  is  to  record  verbatim  the 
child's  answers.  This  secretary  may  be  a  child  of  thirteen  or 
fourteen  years,  provided  he  is  very  intelligent  and  one  can 
supervise  his  work  a  little.  The  subject  to  be  examined  should 
be  kindly  received;  if  he  seems  timid  he  should  be  reassured  at 
once,  not  only  by  a  kind  tone  but  also  by  giving  him  first  the  tests 
which  seem  most  like  play,  for  example — giving  change  for  20 
sous.  Constantly  encourage  him  during  the  tests  in  a  gentle 
voice;  one  should  show  satisfaction  with  his  answers  whatever 
they  may  be.  One  should  never  criticise  nor  lose  time  by  at- 
tempting to  teach  him  the  test;  there  is  a  time  for  everything. 
The  child  is  here  that  his  mental  capacity  may  be  judged,  not 
that  he  may  be  instructed.  Never  help  him  by  a  supplementary 
explanation  which  may  suggest  the  answer.  Often  one  is  tempted 
to  do  so,  but  it  is  wrong. 

Do  not  become  over  anxious  nor  ask  the  child  if  he  has  under- 
stood, a  useless  scruple  since  the  test  is  such  that  he  ought  to 
understand.  Therefore  one  should  adhere  rigorously  to  the 
formulas  of  the  experiment,  without  any  addition  or  omission. 
Encouragement  should  be  in  the  tone  of  voice  or  in  meaningless 
words,  which  serve  only  to  arouse  him.  ''Come  now!  Very 
good!  Hurry  a  little!  Good!  Very  good!  Perfect!  Splendid! 
etc.  etc.''  If  witnesses  are  inevitable  impose  upon  them  a 
rigorous  silence.  How  difficult  this  is  to  obtain!  Every  teacher 
wishes  to  interfere  in  the  examination,  to  supplement  the  expla- 
nation of  an  embarrassed  pupil,  especially  if  he  belongs  to  her 
class.    Have  the  courage  to  insist  that  they  keep  silent. 

Always  begin  with  the  tests  that  fit  the  child's  age.  If  one 
gives  him  too  difficult  work  at  first  he  is  discouraged.  If,  on 
the  contrary,  it  is  too  easy  it  arouses  his  contempt,  and  he  asks 
himself  if  he  is  not  being  made  fun  of,  and  so  makes  no  effort. 
We  have  seen  manifestations  of  this  misplaced  self-esteem. 

On  the  part  of  the  experimenter,  some  conditions  are  necessary. 
He  must  not  allow  himself  to  be  influenced  by  information  regard- 
ing the  child  obtained  from  other  sources.  He  must  say  to  him- 
self that  nothing  which  he  already  knows  about  the  child  counts 


CONDITIONS   OF   THE   EXAMINATION  237 

at  all.  He  must  consider  the  child  as  an  X  to  be  solved  by  this 
means  alone.  He  must  be  entirely  convinced  that  by  using  this 
method,  he  will  be  able  by  it  alone  to  obtain  a  thorough  knowl- 
edge of  the  child  without  depending  on  any  outside  help.  But 
this  self-confidence  is  liable  to  many  fluctuations.  In  the  be- 
ginning everything  seems  easy;  it  is  the  period  of  illusions. 
After  a  few  trials,  if  one  has  at  all  the  critical  spirit,  errors  are 
seen  everywhere,  and  this  leads  to  discouragement.  But  if  one 
keeps  at  it  faithfully,  patiently,  confidence  will  return  little  by 
little;  it  is  no  longer  the  optimism  of  the  beginner,  but  a  confidence 
grounded  upon  deliberate  reason  and  proof;  one  has  a  conscious- 
ness of  his  own  power  as  well  as  of  his  limitations. 

This  period  of  initiation  should  last  through  at  least  5  or  6 
sessions  of  two  hours  each,  and  bear  upon  a  total  of  twenty 
children.  Every  experimenter  wishing  to  conunence  should 
submit  himself  to  a  similar  preparation. 

Classification  of  the  tests  according  to  age.  We  here  give  the 
series  of  tests^^  ranged  according  to  the  ages  at  which  the  majority 

"  These  tests  are  not  the  first  ones  of  which  we  had  thought;  if  we  keep 
them  it  is  after  long  trial;  they  appear  to  us  all  good  and  practical.  But 
we  are  far  from  claiming  that  they  are  the  best.  Those  who  will  take  up 
this  work  after  us  will  find  better;  they  will  certainly  succeed  in  eliminat- 
ing more  strictly  than  we  have  been  able  to  do,  the  tests  that  are  influenced 
by  education.  In  pursuing  the  experiments  we  have  ourselves  succeeded 
in  making  some  improvements.  But  we  have  made  no  record  of  them,  in 
order  not  to  change  the  economy  of  the  work  and  the  value  of  our  figures  as 
to  the  result.  The  main  point  after  all  is  that  on  the  one  hand  the  principle 
of  the  measure  of  intelligence  be  stated,  and  on  the  other  that  our  method 
be,  in  spite  of  its  defects,  good  enough  to  be  put  into  practice. 

We  lack  time  to  establish  tests  corresponding  to  ages  under  3  years. 
Our  experiment  in  hospitals  showed  us  which  are  the  tests  to  be  used,  but 
we  do  not  yet  know  to  which  exact  age  of  normal  development  they  corre- 
spond.    In  any  case  we  give  them  here  for  reference. 

Voluntary  look  (follow  a  lighted  match  which  the  experimenter  moves). 

Prehension  of  an  object  by  contact  (put  the  object  in  contact  with  the 
hand.) 

Prehension  after  visual  perception.  (One  hands  the  object  and  the  child 
must  try  to  take  it.) 

Knowledge  of  food.  (One  presents  a  piece  of  wood,  then  a  biscuit.  One 
notices  if  the  child  rejects  the  piece  of  wood  to  take  the  biscuit.) 

Execution  of  order  given  by  gestures.  (For  instance,  the  order  to  sit 
down.) 

Imitation  of  simple  gestures.     (For  instance,  clap  the  hands.) 


238 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 


of  children  succeed  in  them.  This  constitutes  our  measuring 
scale  of  intelligence.  Those  who  adopt  our  method  will  very  often 
need  to  refer  to  it. 

(For  discussion  see  pages  indicated) 


Three  years 

Show  eyes,  nose,  mouth  (p.  184). 
Name  objects  in  a  picture  (p.  188). 
Repeat  2  figures  (p.  187). 
Repeat  a  sentence  of  6  syllables  (p. 

186). 
Give  last  name  (p.  194). 

Four  years 

Give  sex  (p.  195). 
Name  key,  knife,  penny  (p.  195). 
Repeat  3  figures  (p.  196). 
Compare  2  lines  (p.  196). 

Five  years 

Compare  2  bojfes  of  different  weights 

(p.  196). 
Copy  a  square*  (p.  198). 
Repeat  a  sentence  of  10  syllables  (p. 

186). 
Count4soug  (p.  200). 
Put  together  two  pieces  in  a  "game 

of  patience"  (p.  198). 

Six  years 

Repeat  a  sentence  of  16  syllables 
(p.  186). 

Compare  two  figures  from  an  esthet- 
ic point  of  view  (p.  202). 

Define  by  use  only,  some  simple  ob- 
jects (p.  202). 

Execute  3  simultaneous  commis- 
sions (p.  205). 

Give  one's  age  (p.  206). 

Distinguish  morning  and  evening 
(p.  206). 

Seven  years 

Indicate  omissions  in  drawings  (p. 
207). 


Give  the  number  of  fingers  (p.  209). 
Copy  a  written  sentence  (p.  209). 
Copy  a  triangle  and  a  diamond  (p. 

209). 
Repeat  5  figures  (p.  210). 
Describe  a  picture  (p.  210). 
Count  13  single  sous  (p.  210). 
Name  4  pieces  of  money  (p.  211). 

Eight  years 

Read  selection  and  retain  two  mem- 
ories (p.  211). 

Count  9  sous.  (3  single  and  3 
double)  (p.  214). 

Name  four  colors  (p.  215). 

Count  backward  from  20-0  (p.  215). 

Compare  2  objects  from  memory  (p. 
216). 

Write  from  dictation  (p.  216). 

Nine  years 

Give     the     date     complete     (day, 

month,  day  of  the  month,  year) 

(p.  217). 
Name  the  days  of  the  week  (p.  218). 
Give  definitions  superior  to  use  (p, 

205). 
Retain  6  memories  after  reading  (p. 

220). 
Make  change,  4  sous  from  20  sous 

(p.  218). 
Arrange  5  weights  in  order  (p.  220). 

Ten  years 

Name  the  months  (p.  221). 
Name  9  pieces  of  money  (p.  221). 
Place  3  words  in  2  sentences  (p.  222), 
Answer  3  comprehension  questions 
(p.  224). 


ESTEVIATE    OF   KESULTS  239 

Answer  5  comprehension  questions  Twelve  years 

^P-  ^^^^-  Repeat  7  figures  (p.  232). 

Eleven  years  Find  3  rhymes  (p.  232). 

^  ...  .  ,  .   .   .         ,         Repeat  a  sentence  of  26  syllables 

Criticize  sentences  containing  ab-  /      230"^ 

surdities  (p.  227).  Interpret  pictures  (p.  193). 

Place  3  words  m  1  sentence  (p.  229).  Problem  of  facts  (p.  233). 

Find  more  than  60  words  in  3  min- 
utes (p.  229).  Thirteen  years 

Give  abstract  definitions  (p.  230).  Paper  cutting  (p.  234). 

Place  disarranged  words  in  order      Reversed  triangle  (p.  235). 

(p.  231).  Give  differences  of  meaning  (p.  235). 

A  few  words  upon  the  value  6i  this  classification.  It  is  not 
exact  for  the  age  of  three  years,  because  certain  tests  placed  at  the 
level  of  that  age  can  be  done  by  much  younger  children,  children 
of  two  years  for  instance.  But  this  does  not  trouble  us,  for  the 
measuring  scale  that  we  present  is  designed  only  for  children 
of  school  age.  Should  a  child  of  three  years  present  himself 
these  tests  are  sufficient  to  classify  him.  The  only  difi&culty  that 
could  arise  would  be  in  classifying  a  child  of  two  years. 

At  the  other  extremity  of  the  scale,  there  is  also  a  little  un- 
certainty. A  pupil  who  passes  all  the  tests  for  the  thirteenth 
year  may  have  a  mental  capacity  superior  to  that  age.  But  how 
much?     Our  tests  do  not  show  us. 

II.  Necessity  of  Making  an  Estimate  of  RESUiiTS 

In  the  course  of  our  explanation,  we  have  insisted  on  the 
character  of  our  method  of  measuring.  Notwithstanding  ap- 
pearances it  is  not  an  automatic  method  comparable  to  a  weigh- 
ing machine  in  a  railroad  station  on  which  one  need  but  stand 
in  order  that  the  machine  throw  out  the  weight  printed  on  a 
ticket.  It  is  a  method  which  requires  some  originality  to  operate, 
and  we  warn  the  busy  doctor  who  would  apply  it  by  means  of 
hospital  attendants  that  he  will  be  disappointed.  The  results 
of  our  examination  have  no  value  if  deprived  of  all  comment; 
they  need  to  be  interpreted.  We  are  conscious  that  in  insisting 
upon  the  necessity  of  this  interpretation  we  seem  to  open  the  door 
to  arbitrary  opinions  and  to  deprive  our  method  of  all  precision. 
This  is  so  only  in  appearance.  Our  examination  of  intelUgence 
will  'always  be  superior  to  the  ordinary  examinations  of  instruc- 


240  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

tion,  because  it  has  many  advantages  over  these.  It  unfolds 
according  to  an  invariable  plan,  it  takes  the  exact  age  into  ac- 
count; it  not  only  depends  upon  the  repUes  but  compares  them 
with  a  norm  which  is  at  the  same  time  a  real  average  determined 
by  experience. 

If  in  spite  of  all  this  precision  we  admit  that  the  process  must 
be  used  with  intelligence,  we  do  not  think  its  value  lessened  by 
such  reservation.  The  microscope,  the  graph  method,  are 
admirable  examples  of  precision;  but  how  much  inteUigence, 
circumspection,  erudition  and  skill  are  implied  in  the  practice  of 
these  methods!  And  can  one  imagine  any  value  in  the  observa- 
tions made  with  the  microscope  by  one  who  was  an  ignoramus 
and  at  the  same  time  an  imbecile?  We  have  seen  examples  of 
this  and  it  makes  us  shudder. 

It  is  necessary  then  to  abandon  the  idea  that  a  method  of  in- 
vestigation can  be  made  precise  enough  to  be  entrusted  to  the 
first  comer.  Every  scientific  process  is  an  instrument  which 
needs  to  be  directed  by  an  intelligent  hand.  With  this  new 
instrument  that  we  have  just  made  we  have  examined  more  than 
300  subjects.  At  each  new  examination  our  attention  has  been 
aroused,  surprised,  charmed  by  the  observations  we  have  made 
upon  the  manner  of  response,  the  manner  of  understanding,  the 
mischievousness  of  some,  the  stupidity  of  others,  and  the  thousand 
peculiarities  which  go  to  make  up  the  attractive  spectacle  of  an 
intelHgence  in  activity.  Some  persons  to  whom,  very  rarely 
however,  we  have  accorded  the  privilege  of  witnessing  our  tests, 
have  also  understood  and  have,  of  their  own  accord,  declared 
what  a  deep  impression  they  had  received,  and  how  they  were  able 
to  form  a  good  idea  of  the  intelhgence  of  each  child,  even  those 
whom  they  had  known  for  a  long  time.  It  is  this  deep  impres- 
sion that  one  should  know  how  to  gather,  interpret  and  estimate 
at  its  true  value.  The  notations  that  we  recommend  should 
serve  only  as  an  aid  to  the  memory,  and  to  facilitate  the  assem- 
bling of  those  elements  out  of  which  our  mind  alone  can  compose 
the  synthesis. 

With  these  reservations  we  shall  now  explain  our  system  of 
recording. 

Recording  results.  In  practice  one  has  before  him  in  a  vertical 
column  the  names  of  the  tests  in  the  order  in  which  we  have  here 
given  them.     The  tests  for  the  different  ages  are  separated  by 


ESTIMATE   OF  KESULTS  241 

a  horizontal  line.  When  one  is  about  to  test  a  child,  begin  with 
the  tests  for  his  age,  and  according  as  the  test  has  been  passed 
or  not,  mark  the  answer  with  the  sign  +  or  — .  But  that  record 
is  not  sufficiently  graded;  it  is  necessary,  we  think,  to  adopt  the 
exclamation  point  for  those  cases  where  the  failure  takes  on  an 
evident  character  of  absurdity.  Let  us  cite  some  examples  of 
absurd  replies. 

Repetition  of  sentences.  What  we  have  called  ^'bafouillage" — 
(words  that  have  no  sense) . 

Repetition  of  jive  figures.  Pronouncing  the  figures  in  the  natural 
order.  One  has  said:  2,  8,  7,  3,  9.  The  child  says  8,  2,  3,  4,  5,  6, 
7,  9.  This  is  a  particularly  serioug  error,  if  the  child  who  makes 
it  has  been  able  at  another  time  to  repeat  5  figures.  It  is  then 
clear  that  it  is  not  so  much  memory  that  he  lacks,  as  judgment. 

Study  of  a  picture.  Making  lengthy  emmierations  impUes  a 
childish  intelligence  having  had  experience  which  has  not  devel- 
oped it.     This  is  often  encountered  among  the  subnormal. 

To  count  thirteen  sous.  To  know  how  to  count  correctly  as 
far  as  30  and  then  in  counting  13  sous  to  make  a  serious  error — 
for  example  of  ten  units. 

Pieces  of  money.  To  invent;  to  discover  pieces  of  25  sous;  30 
sous;  3  francs;  30  francs,  etc. 

Reading.  To  mispronounce  words  when  one  is  able  to  read 
fluently. 

Counting  backwards.  To  skip  regularly  2  figures  at  the  end  of 
a  certain  time,  which  indicates  that  the  directing  idea  is  lost; 
or  even  after  having  counted  backwards  to  begin  counting 
forwards. 

Defining  objects.  To  repeat  the  word,  as  "a  chair  is  a  chair." 
Or  to  point  to  the  object,  ''a  table.''  ''There  it  is"  (placing 
his  finger  on  the  table) . 

Date.  Inventing  extraordinary  dates.  Saying  it  is  the  year 
19;  it  is  the  month  9,  etc. 

Memory  of  what  is  read.  Inventing  statements  which  have  not 
been  read. 

Comparison  from  memory.  Repeating  the  word.  Saying: 
"Wood  is  made  of  wood.     Glass  is  made  of  glass." 

Making  change  from  twenty  sous.  Giving  change  at  random, 
5  francs,  10  francs,  etc;  or  giving  a  number  much  less  than  16 
sous;  using  pieces  of  known  value,  for  example — giving  19  sous 
with  a  10-sou  piece  and  the  rest  in  single  sous. 


242  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

Arranging  weights  in  order.  Making  mistakes  which  indicate 
that  the  subject  has  not  understood  the  meaning  "decreasing;" 
or  arranging  the  boxes,  hap-hazard,  two  by  two. 

Three  words  in  a  sentence.  To  write  a  sentence  without  sense  as, 
"Paris  is  a  city  of  fortune  for  the  streams.'^ 

Criticism  of  sentences.  Absurd  answers.  For  instance  to 
answer  the  second  sentence  with  ''It  is  Ernest  who  was  not  kind. " 
To  the  third,  *'  'Tis  Hke  saying,  I  am  not  well. " 

Abstract  definitions.  Absurdities.  Example.  "Charity  is  to 
raise  one^s  hat. " 

Arranging  words  in  a  sentence.  Making  a  sentence  void  of 
sense:  "One  must  finish  his  exercises."  "A  good  dog  his  bravely 
master  defends. " 

Rhymes.  Coining  words,  or  sometimes,  what  is  worse,  coin- 
ing words  that  have  not  even  the  merit  of  rhyming. 

Such  answers  deserve  not  merely  a  minus  but  an  exclamation 
point  as  well. 

Utilization  of  notes.  A  series  of  signs  is  thus  obtained  in  a 
vertical  column;  these  signs  succeed  one  another  irregularly; 
here  are  minus  signs,  there  are  plus  signs.  How  shall  they  be 
interpreted?  First  of  all  it  is  evident  that  in  whatever  order  we 
place  the  tests,  we  shall  never  be  able  to  find  any  single  test  of 
such  a  nature  that  when  this  One  has  been  passed,  all  the  previous 
ones  will  also  be  successful,  and  all  the  following  ones  failures. 

This  order  of  tests  might  be  estabUshed  for  one  child  in  partic- 
ular, but  the  same  order  would  not  be  satisfactory  for  a  second 
or  a  third.  So,  let  us  examine  the  results  of  the  order  of  the 
tests  which  we  have  chosen,  and  let  us  see  how  ten  children  of 
nine  years  react.  For  the  five  tests  at  nine  years,  which  furnish 
50  repHes  (since  there  are  5  tests  and  ten  pupils)  there  are  6  failures 
and  44  successes.  For  the  tests  at  ten  years,  there  are  14  failures 
and  36  successes.  A  test  limit  could  never  be  found  which  would 
stop  all  the  children,  or  which  would  stop  only  children  of  that 
age,  or  to  which  they  would  all  attain.  That  would  be  a  very 
convenient  criterion,  but  we  have  never  found  it,  nor  do  we  be- 
lieve it  exists.  The  reahty  is  less  simple.  What  we  have  found 
is  the  following:  children  of  nine  years  pass  all  the  easy  tests; 
in  the  very  difficult  tests,  children  of  nine  years  pass  none;  in  the 
tests  of  moderate  difficulty  some  pass  one,  some  another.  This 
varies  with  each  child.     This  is  a  fact  of  which  one  must  take 


ESTIMATE   OF  RESULTS  243 

account.  Every  child  has  his  individuality;  one  succeeds  best 
in  test  "A"  and  fails  in  test  "B";  another,  of  the  same  age,  fails 
in  "A"  and  on  the  other  hand  succeeds  in  ''B."  How  shall  we 
account  for  these  individual  differences  in  the  experimental  results? 
We  do  not  know  exactly;  it  is  probable  that  the  mental  faculties 
involved  in  the  tests  are  different,  and  of  unequal  development 
in  the  children.  If  a  child  has  a  better  memory  than  one  of  his 
companions,  it  is  natural  that  he  should  succeed  better  in  a  test 
of  simple  repetition.  Another  who  has  already  a  trained  hand 
will  succeed  better  in  the  arranging  of  the  weights.  Another 
reason  may  be  alleged.  All  our  tests  suppose  an  effort  of  at- 
tention; and  attention  varies  constantly  in  the  degree  of  concen- 
tration, especially  among  the  young;  now  it  is  intense;  a  moment 
later  it  is  relaxed.  Suppose  that  the  subject  has  a  moment  of 
distraction,  of  constraint,  of  ennui  during  a  test;  he  fails.  One 
cannot  doubt  the  weight  of  this  last  reason.  We  are  so  con- 
vinced of  it  that  we  consider  it  chimerical  and  absurd  to  judge 
the  intelHgence  of  a  child  on  any  single  test. 

From  the  preceding  considerations  we  conclude  that  we  can 
determine  the  intellectual  level  of  a  child  only  by  the  sum  total 
of  the  tests.  Success  in  many  different  tests  is  alone  characteris- 
tic. The  mark  of  intelligence  is  therefore  not  made  nor  can  it 
be  made  as  one  measures  height.  For  the  height/^  it  suffices 
to  have  a  table  of  average  measurements  for  that  age.  Being 
given  a  child  we  take  his  height  and  referring  it  to  the  table  of 
average  measurements  we  easily,  by  a  simple  reckoning,  learn 
if  the  child  measures  up  to  the  average  for  his  age,  or  if  he  is 
backward  by  one  year,  by  two  years,  etc.,  or  on  the  contrary 
advanced  a  year  or  two  years,  etc.  Such  a  process  of  estima- 
tion is  on  the  whole  but  slightly  artificial. 

It  is  altogether  different  for  the  measure  of  intelligence.  If  one 
wishes  to  apply  the  same  system  of  comparison  between  the 
intelligence  of  a  child  and  the  average  intelligence  of  children 
at  different  ages,  one  is  at  once  confronted  with  the  difficulty 
that  we  have  noted  above.  A  child  is  backward  in  certain  of  the 
tests  for  his  age  and  in  advance  for  others.  We  think  it  possible 
to  overcome  this  difficulty;  but  it  is  on  condition  that  we  adopt 
some  arbitrary  rule;  and  the  said  rule,  however  good  it  may  be, 

^'  See  Ann4e  psychologique,  Vol.  XII,  p.  9  and  fif. 


244  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

will  always  give  an  artificial  character  to  the  procedure,  and  to 
such  a  degree  that  if,  by  chance,  one  had  adopted  another  rule, 
one  would  arrive  at  quite  different  results. 

We  believe  it  necessary  to  insist  on  this  point  for  we  shall  later 
be  led  to  say,  for  the  sake  of  simplicity  of  language,  that  a  child 
of  eight  years  has  the  intelligence  of  a  child  of  seven  or  of  nine 
years.  These  expressions,  because  they  are  arbitrary,  might 
cause  some  illusions.  It  is  necessary  to  remember  that  the 
expression  "retarded"  or  "advanced  intelligence,"  results  partly 
from  the  conventional  procedure  that  we  have  adopted.^*^ 

This  procedure  is  the  following:  A  subject  has  the  intellectual 
development  of  the  highest  age  at  which  he  passes  all  the  tests,  with  the 
allowance  of  one  failure  in  the  tests  for  that  age.  Thus  young  Ernest 
has  passed  all  the  tests  at  nine  years,  except  one;  he  has  also 
passed  all  the  tests  at  ten  years  except  one;  therefore  we  attribute 
to  him  the  mental  level  of  ten  years. 

But  this  rule  is  too  strict,  and  an  example  will  serve  to  make 
this  clear.  Suppose  that  Jean  who  is  nine  years  old  passes  all 
the  tests  at  nine  years  except  two,  and  all  the  tests  at  ten  years 
except  two.  Would  that  place  him  on  the  level  of  eight  years? 
That  would  be  to  make  him  lose  the  advantage  of  the  tests  he  has 
passed.  We  propose  the  following  compensating  rule;  When 
once  the  intellectual  level  of  a  child  is  fixed,  give  him  the  benefit  of  an 
advance  of  one  year  every  time  he  passes  at  least  five  of  the  tests 
beyond  his  level,  and  the  benefit  of  an  advance  of  two  years  if  he 
has  passed  at  least  ten  above  his  level.  Thus,  Jean  aged  nine  is 
at  the  level  of  eight  years,  which  one  expresses  by  saying  that  he 
is  -1  (that  is,  in  other  words,  a  year  behind).  But  he  has  passed 
3  tests  at  nine  years  and  3  tests  at  ten  years;  he  has  been  6 
points  in  advance  of  his  level;  he  has  gained  a  year;  he  is  then 
at  the  level  of  nine  years,  he  tests  at  age,  and  is  marked  = . 

By  employing  this  process,  one  succeeds  in  classifying  satis- 
factorily nearly  all  children.  We  may  even  say  all,  if  we  ignore 
two  or  three  exceptions  which  we  found  among  the  pupils  of  the 
Maternal  School.  Thus  a  Uttle  girl  of  six  years  lacked  two  of  the 
tests  at  four  years;  she  lacked  four  of  those  at  five  years  and  five 
of  those  at  six  years;  unless  she  was  placed  at  the  level  of  three 
years  one  would  not  know  where  she  belonged.     The  cause  of  the 

2"  For  final  rule  see  p.  278. 


ILLUSTRATIVE   CASES  245 

difficulty  came  from  the  following  fact.  She  had  an  extremely 
weak  memory  and  could  repeat  neither  the  sentence  nor  the 
figures  correctly.  She  had  had,  we  were  told,  attacks  of  epilepsy. 
These  are  exceptions  to  the  rule,  but  we  have  proved  that  ordi- 
narily these  are  found  in  abnormal  cases. 

Let  us  cite  some  examples,  giving  at  the  same  time  the  appli- 
cation of  our  method  and  the  aspect  of  one  of  our  examinations. 

One  day  we  examined  in  a  school  two  children  of  seven  years. 
The  Director  who  called  them  into  his  office  scarcely  knew  them; 
they  were  children  who  had  been  in  his  school  only  four  or  five 
months.  We  asked  for  no  information  about  these  children, 
nor  did  we  wish  any  beyond  what  was  furnished  by  our  psycho- 
logical tests. 

riRST   OBSERVATION 

Let  us  commence  with  Rene  T .    We  gave  to  him  the  seven 

year  tests.  He  passes  all  but  the  last.  We  reproduce  his  an- 
swers. Tests  of  seven  years:  Unfinished  pictures.  +  .Answers: 
The  first  lacks,  the  eyes;  second,  the  neck;  third,  the  mouth;  fourth, 
the  arms.     Except  for  an  error  in  the  second,  all  are  correct. 

Ten  fi,ngers.  +  .  Q.  How  many  fingers  have  you  on  your 
right  hand?  A.  Five.  Q.  And  on  the  left  hand?  A.  Five. 
Q.  And  on  both?    A,  Ten. 

Copying  triangle  and  diamond.  +  .  His  copy  is  very  satis- 
factory, he  has  even  drawn  two  sides  of  the  diamond  with  a 
continuous  line. 

Copy  of  sentence.  +      Excellent. 

Repetition  of  five  figures.  +  .  He  succeeds.  Q.  3,  2,  7,  9,  5. 
A.  3,  2,  — .  Q.  6,  1,  8,  3,  9,  A.  6,  1,  8,  3,  9.  Q.  3,  0,  2,  8,  5. 
A.  3,  0 — .     Notice  that  he  succeeded  only  once. 

Description  of  pictures.  +  .  He  is  very  slow,  but  he  makes  the 
description.  First  picture.  ''A  boy  and  a  man  who  are  dragging 
a  wagon  in  the  snow."  Second.  ''I  see  that  the  man  sleeps 
with  his  wife,"  Third.  ''A  man  who  is  standing  on  the  bench 
looking  out  of  a  window." 

Counting  thirteen  sous.  +  .     He  counts  correctly. 

Four  pieces  of  money.  —  .  He  recognizes  and  names  one  sou, 
2  sous,  10  sous;  he  does  not  know  the  5-franc  piece. 

To  sum  up,  he  passes  all  the  tests  but  one;  and  moreover  he 
almost  fails  in  repeating  five  figures.  Let  us  now  take  the  tests 
of  eight  years. 


246  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

Tests  of  eight  years.  Reading.  —  .  He  reads  with  difficulty 
the  various  facts  and  remembers  nothing. 

Counting  nine  sous.  +  .     He  counts  correctly. 

Four  colors.  —  .  He  names  all  but  the  green  which  he  does 
not  know,  and  refrains  from  naming. 

Counting  backwards.  +  .     Correct. 

Comparisons  from  memory. -\r  .  First  question .  A.  The  wings 
are  larger.  Q.  The  wings  of  what?  A.  Of  the  butterfly.  Second 
question.  A.  The  wood  is  thicker  than  the  glass.  Third  ques- 
tion.   A.  Because  the  paper  is  finer.     These  answers  are  good. 

Writing  from  dictation.  —  .  Insufficient.  He  writes  three 
words  which  he  runs  together;  however,  the  result  nearly  attains 
the  required  limit. 

So  he  fails  on  three  tests  of  eight  years;  two  are  of  instruction 
and  moreover  those  on  which  he  fails  he  almost  passes.  Let  us 
go  on  to  nine  years. 

Tests  of  nine  years.  Complete  date.  —  ,  He  knows  the  day, 
the  month,  the  day  of  the  month,  but  not  the  year. 

The  days  of  the  week.  +  .    He  recites  these  correctly. 

Definitions  superior  to  use.  +  .  Q.  What  is  a  fork?  A. 
Silence.  Q.  What  is  a  table?  A.  A  table  is  of  wood.  Q.  A 
chair?  A.  A  chair  is  of  wood.  Q.  A  fork?  A.  It  is  of  iron. 
Q.  A  horse?  A.  A  horse  is  of  meat.  Q.  And  a  mama?  A, 
A  mama  is  of  flesh.  These  definitions  of  a  chemist  are  superior 
to  use.    Note  the  naivete  of  the  last. 

Reading  with  six  memories.  —  .     He  can  recall  nothing. 

To  make  change  of  sixteen  sous  from  twenty  sous.  -{-  .  Very  slow. 
He  counts  on  his  fingers  to  find  the  differences  between  4  and 
20.     Then  he  gives  a  10-sou  piece,  a  5-sou  piece,  and  a  1-sou  piece. 

Arranging  weights.  +  .  He  makes  a  mistake  but  once  in  three 
times  and  this  very  slight.  These  are  his  three  arrangements: 
3,  6,  9,  15,  12;  3,  6,  9,  12,  15;  3,  6,  9,  12,  15. 

If  one  is  not  satisfied  with  recording  automatically,  but  studies 
each  of  the  tests  he  still  has  a  favorable  impression.  Ren6 
lacked  but  little  of  succeeding  in  the  first  test,  the  date;  he  made 
change  beautifully,  using  the  five  and  ten-sou  pieces.  He 
arranged  the  weights  in  a  manner  almost  perfect.  Let  us  pass 
to  the  tests  of  ten  years. 

Tests  of  ten  years.  Months,  -  .  He  recites  only  the  first 
four  then  stops. 


ILLUSTRATIVE   CASES  247 

Pieces  of  money.  —  .    We  saw  that  he  does  not  know  them  all. 

Three  words  in  two  sentences.  —  .  He  fails.  Not  knowing  how 
to  write  he  does  not  understand  the  word  sentence. 

Questions  of  comprehension,  First  series.  +  .  First  question. 
A.  One  must  wait.  Second  question.  ^.  To  do  nothing. 
Third  question,  A.  Pay  for  it.  These  answers  are  good  and  the 
test  is  passed. 

Other  questions.  —  .    He  answers  by  silence  to  the  five  questions. 

Thus  we  see  that  he  is  able  to  answer  at  least  one  of  the  tests 
of  ten  years.  For  the  rest  he  fails  chiefly  for  reasons  beyond  his 
intelligence  because  of  the  lack  of  instruction.  We  were  curious 
to  know  how  many  words  he  would  say  in  three  minutes.  That  is  a 
test  that  requires  no  instruction.  But  he  cited  five  or  six  words, 
then  stopped,  much  embarrassed;  we  waited  for  him,  encouraged 
him,  but  he  could  find  no  more. 

Let  us  sum  up  and  pass  judgment.  He  succeeded  in  all  but 
one  of  the  tests  of  seven  years.  Then,  he  is  at  least  of  the  seven 
year  level.  Furthermore,  he  passed  eight  tests  of  the  ages 
following;  he  is  then  more  than  a  year  in  advance  of  his  age. 

Let  us  mark  him  +  1 . 

SECOND    OBSERVATION. 

The  preceding  pupil  was  followed  by  young  Mod ,  who 

was  also  seven  years  old.     His  countenance  appeared  as  intelh- 

gent  as  that  of  T but  one  should  guard  against  individual 

diagnoses  furnished  solely  by  the  examination  of  a  countenance. 
Or  rather  one  ought  to  judge  the  intelligence  of  a  countenance 
chiefly  when  the  subject  is  in  action,  and  is  making  an  effort  to 
understand. 

From  his  first  answers  Mod surprised  us.    Your  age? 

He  answered  seven  years  and  a  half,  when  he  is  not  yet  seven 
years.  Is  it  morning  or  evening?  He  answered,  morning; 
it  was  afternoon.  If  we  had  wished  to  make  only  a  rapid  test,  we 
should  give  the  tests  of  six  years;  but  as  this  was  a  regular  demon- 
stration, we  continued  the  tests  for  seven  years  as  our  subject 
was  of  that  age.  Strange  to  say,  he  did  not  pass  any;  moreover, 
his  failures  were  complete  and  serious. 

Tests  of  seven  years.  Unfinished  'pictures.  —  .  First  figure, 
silence.  Second,  the  neck.  Third,  the  neck.  Fourth,  silence. 
No  answer  correct. 


248  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

Number  of  fingers.  —  .  Q.  How  many  fingers  on  your  right 
hand?  A.  Five.  Q.  On  the  left?  A.  Six.  Q.  On  both?  A, 
Ten. 

Copying  diamond.  —  .  His  drawing  is  defective  and  the  dia- 
mond unrecognizable. 

Copy  of  a  sentence.  —  .     Illegible. 

Repetition  of  five  figures.  —  .     Complete  failure. 

Q.  2,  8,  5,  9,  7.  A.  Silence.  0.3,7,2,5,9.  A.  3,  2,  4—. 
Q.  6,  2,  8,  5,  7,    A.  8,  9. 

Pictures.  —  .  First  picture.  A.  A  man.  Q.  And  then?  A. 
A  little  boy.  Q.  And  then?  A.  A  wagon.  Second  picture. 
A.  A  man  and  a  lady.  Q.  And  then?  A.  A  hat.  Third  pic- 
ture. A.  I  see  a  man.  Q.  And  then?  A.  A  table  and  a  chair. 
It  is  evident  that  it  is  an  enumeration  such  as  a  three  year  old 
child  would  make.    What  a  level! 

Counting  thirteen  single  sous.  —  .  He  knew  how  to  count;  he  did 
not  count  the  same  piece  twice,  but  he  lacked  method;  for  having 
finished,  he  began  to  recount  a  series  already  counted  and  so 
reached  20.     It  was  a  great  error  of  intelligence. 

Four  pieces  of  money.  —  .  Again  enormous  errors.  He  called 
3  sous  a  5-franc  piece.     He  called  1  sou  a  10-sou  piece. 

Evidently  we  made  a  great  mistake  in  applying  to  him  the 
tests  of  his  own  age.  Let  us  go  back;  in  order  that  the  demon- 
stration be  complete,  let  us  give  him  all  the  tests  starting  with 
those  of  three  years. 

Tests  for  three  years.  Show  your  nose,  eyes,  mouth.  +  .  He 
did  as  commanded. 

Enumeration  in  pictures.  +  .  We  have  seen  that  he  could  do 
that. 

Two  figures.  +  .     He  repeated  them  correctly. 

Six  syllables.  +  .  He  repeated  them  but  with  a  babyish 
".baf  ouillage. " 

Family  name.  +  .  He  did  not  give  that  by  which  he  was 
registered,  but  that  of  his  foster  father. 

Tests  of  four  years.  +  .     He  passed  all  the  tests. 

Sex.  +  .     He  indicated  it  correctly. 

Knife,  key,  sou.  +  .     He  named  them. 

Three  figures.  +  .     He  repeated  them. 

Comparison  of  lines.  +  .     His  designation  was  correct. 

Tests  of  five  years.     Comparison  of  two  weights.  +  .     He  passed 


ILLUSTRATIVE   CASES  249 

this  test,  but  with  difficulty.  Q.  Give  me  the  heavier  box. 
In  answer  he  gave  a  box,  but  without  comparing  it  with  the  other. 
It  was  necessary  to  tell  him  to  take  both  boxes  in  his  hand. 
At  four  or  five  years  a  child  should  not  need  this  advice.  More- 
over in  three  attempts  he  made  one  mistake. 

Copy  a  square.  +  .     Correct. 

Repetition  of  ten  words.  +  .     Correct  but  indistinct. 

To  count  four  single  sous.  +  .     Correct. 

"Game  of  patience^'  with  2  pieces.  —  .  He  could  not  do  it. 
He  joined  the  two  pieces  haphazard  and  was  satisfied  with  a 
figure  which  resembled  a  triangle. 

So  the  tests  of  five  years  were  passed,  except  the  last,  but  they 
were  barely  passed;  the  first  needed  indulgence. 

Tests  of  six  years.  Right  hand,  left  ear.  —  .  He  showed  the 
right  ear. 

Sentence  of  sixteen  syllables.  —  .  He  could  not  repeat  correctly 
sentences  of  12,  14,  or  16  syllables.  It  was  indistinct  and  many 
words  were  omitted.  For  example:  Q.  We  are  going  for  a  walk; 
Mary  give  me  your  pretty  hat.  A.  He  does  not  repeat  half  the 
words. 

Msthetic  comparison.  —  .  He  did  not  indicate  the  correct 
figures. 

Definitions.  —  .  He  gave  them  by  use  only,  as  at  six  years. 
Q.  A  fork?  A.  Silence.  Q.  A  table.  A.  It  is  for  eating. 
Q.  A  chair?  A.  It  is  to  sit  on.  Q.  A  horse?  A.  It  is  to  work. 
Q.  A  fork?  A.  It  is  for  eating.  Q.  A  mama?  A.  She  is  to 
keep  house. 

Three  commissions.  +  .  He  executed  them  quickly. 

To  recapitulate,  he  has,  with  indulgence,  the  mental  level  of 
five  years.  For  if  he  did  not  pass  all  of  the  tests  of  five  years,  he 
passed  those  of  four  years,  plus  six  of  the  following  tests,  which 
gives  him  five  years.  If  one  gives  him  all  the  tests  of  five  years, 
he  has  only  two  more,  he  remains  then  at  five  years.  Conclusion. 
He  is  two  years  behind  his  age,  that  is  —2. 

Experimental  verifications.  All  of  the  authors  who  have  de- 
vised methods  of  measuring  inteUigence,  or  the  various  faculties 
of  intelHgence,  have  yielded  more  or  less  to  a  false  tendency, 
which  consists  in  limiting  themselves  to  a  priori  constructions. 
The  methods  of  diagnosing  inferior  states  which  have  heretofore 
been  published  are  certainly  not  the  result  of  experimentation; 


250  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

but  their  authors  have  made  use  of  experimentation  only  to  give 
examples  and  to  illustrate  the  tests.  In  spite  of  our  aversion 
to  this  method,  we  have  shown  very  often  that  we  naturally  were 
led  to  treat  the  present  study  from  a  solely  theoretical  point  of 
view.  One  must  beUeve  that  the  formulation  of  rules  leads  one 
logically  to  ignore  facts.  But  one  should  retrace  his  steps.  We 
wish  to  demonstrate  the  part  of  experimentation,  that  is  to  say, 
of  truth  in  our  work. 

'  First  of  all,  it  will  be  noticed  that  our  tests  are  well  arranged  in  a 
real  order  of  increasing  difficulty.  It  is  as  the  result  of  many 
trials,  that  we  have  established  this  order;  we  have  by  no  means 
imagined  that  which  we  present.  If  we  had  left  the  field  clear 
to  our  conjectures,  we  should  certainly  not  have  admitted  that  it 
required  the  space  of  time  comprised  between  four  and  seven  years, 
for  a  child  to  learn  to  repeat  5  figures  in  place  of  3.  Likewise  we 
should  never  have  believed  that  it  is  only  at  ten  years  that  the 
majority  of  children  are  able  to  repeat  the  names  of  the  months 
in  correct  order  without  forgetting  any;  or  that  it  is  only  at  ten 
years  that  a  child  recognizes  all  the  pieces  of  our  money. 

In  order  to  make  perfectly  clear  the  real  hierarchy  of  our  tests, 
we  have  made  a  very  simple  calculation  and  one  easy  to  explain. 
We  have  already  said  that  when  a  child  passed  all  but  one  of  the 
tests  of  a  certain  age,  he  has  the  intellectual  level  of  that  age. 
Let  us  see  if  it  happens  that,  according  to  this  rule,  a  child  may 
lack  the  level  of  a  given  age  but  at  the  same  time  reach  that  of  a 
higher  age.  If  such  a  case  presented  itself,  it  would  be  an  argu- 
ment against  the  hierarchy  that  we  have  admitted.  Let  us  suppose 
that  such  a  case  could  present  itself;  the  independence  of  the  in- 
tellectual faculties  is  great  enough  to  explain  this.  But  is  such  a 
case  often  presented?  Out  of  70  children  whose  repHes  we  have 
examined  from  this  point  of  view,  the  hierarchical  depreciation 
mentioned  has  not  presented  itself  a  single  time.  Let  us  conclude 
that  it  must  therefore  be  very  rare.  Let  us  also  conclude  that 
this  forms  a  first  experimental  confirmation  of  the  order  we  have 
established  in  our  tests. 

We  have  a  second  means  of  learning  if  our  measuring  scale  of 
inteUigence  is  gauged  accurately.  This  means  consists  in  trying 
out  a  large  number  of  children  of  all  ages  and  seeing  if  on  the 
average  they  pass  the  intellectual  tests  of  their  age.  We  have 
made  that  experiment  at  length,  in  the  Primary  and  Maternal 


ILLUSTRATIVE   CASES  251 

schools  for  boys  in  Paris,  on  children  of  the  age  of  three,  four 
five — twelve  years  or  within  two  months  of  this  age.  We  have 
studied  203  children  individually,  each  of  whom  was  examined 
during  a  period  lasting  a  half  hour  at  the  least.  What  result 
may  we  hope  to  obtain  from  this  study?  And  what  must  we 
require  of  this  result  for  it  to  be  a  confirmation  of  our  investi- 
gation? We  ought  not  to  expect  that  all  the  children  of  a  given 
age  should  be  of  the  same  intellectual  level.  That  is  very  evi- 
dent. All  are  not  equally  intelHgent;  and  if  all  were  able  to  reply 
in  the  same  manner  to  any  one  test  it  would  simply  prove  that 
the  test  was  poorly  made,  and  subject  to  some  error,  for  example 
to  suggestion.  Let  us  reckon  then  that  in  a  group  of  children  of 
the  same  age  some  are  necessarily  behind  in  intelligence,  others  in 
advance,  others  regular.  What  we  have  a  right  to  demand  is 
that  there  should  be  a  balance  between  those  who  are  behind 
and  those  who  are  in  advance;  if  we  have  twice  as  many  behind 
as  we  have  in  advance  it  would  show  that  our  tests  are  too  dijffi- 
cult.  But  the  equalization  of  those  retarded  and  those  in  advance 
can  only  be  made  on  large  groups.  What  we  ought  further  to 
demand  is  that  in  the  comparison  of  two  successive  ages,  the 
number  retarded  from  the  higher  age  shall  not  equal  the  number 
of  at  age  pupils  of  the  lower  age.  In  order  to  fix  our  ideas  let  us 
imagine  some  figures;  let  us  compare  nine  and  ten  years.  If 
the  advanced  at  nine  years  number  50,  and  the  at  age  40,  and  at 
ten  years  there  are  50  at  age  and  40  retarded,  it  is  evident  that  the 
results  obtained  by  these  two  different  ages  are  identical,  and  that 
in  consequence  the  children  are  poorly  classified;  if  they  have 
faculties  of  a  different  level,  they  have  been  badly  graded.  It 
is  necessary  that  the  advanced  of  one  year  shall  not  equal  in 
number  the  at  age  pupils  of  the  higher  year,  and  that  the  at  age 
of  one  year  shall  not  equal  the  number  of  retarded  pupils  of  the 
preceding  year. 

Glance  at  our  results  and  see  if  they  satisfy  these  various  con- 
ditions. At  three  and  four  years,  we  have  a  considerable  number 
of  backward  pupils.  This  is  explained  by  particular  conditions. 
Young  children  often  refuse  to  answer  from  ill-will,  or  from  timid- 
ity. The  latter  influence  is  perhaps  the  more  rare,  for  timidity  is 
a  feeling  of  social  decorum,  a  trait  of  intelligent  children,  and  this 
trait  usually  develops  later  than  three  or  four  years.  But  ill- 
will  is  frequent.     We  have  seen  a  child  of  three  years  who  would 


252 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 


not  take  the  pencil  offered  him;  he  would  not  make  any  movement 
even  of  defense  when  the  pencil  was  put  under  his  nose.  As 
that  child  walks  and  talks,  we  attribute  his  action  to  ill-will, 
for  taking  the  pencil  was  a  more  simple  act  than  speech. 

Let  us  remark  also  that  between  nine  and  ten  years  the  differ- 
ences are  not  great.  Is  it  because  our  tests  are  insufficient? 
We  do  not  know. 

Nevertheless  it  is  true  that  the  backward  pupils  of  ten  years  are 
ahnost  equal  in  number  to  the  regular  pupils  of  nine  years,  and 
that  the  advanced  pupils  of  nine  years  equal  in  number  the  reg- 
ular pupils  of  ten.  Aside  from  these  remarks  it  seems  to  us  that 
our  scale  follows  in  a  satisfying  manner  the  progress  of  age,  as  the 
following  table,  which  is  the  result  of  many  experiments,  shows 
very  clearly. 


Table  showing  the  number  of  pupils  intellectually  at  age 
retarded  for  the  different  ages  of  school  life 

advanced,  and 

AQES 

3 

4 

5 

6 

7 

8 

9 

10 

11 

12 

TOTALS 

At  age 

3 
3 

4 

9 
2 

1 
4 

1 

13 
6 

4 

5 

8 

6 

1 

7 
7 

3 
1 

16 

5 

1 
1 

11 

9 
2 

14 
2 

9 
3 

13 

5 
2 

2 

5 

4 

103 

Advanced  by  1  year 

Advanced  by  2  years 

Retarded  by  1  year 

1}- 

Retarded  by  2  years 

So  103  pupils  are  at  age,  have  exactly  the  mental  level  that  we 
attribute  to  their  age ;  44  are  advanced ;  56  are  retarded.  We  have 
here  a  confirmation,  which  is  greater  even  than  we  had  supposed 
a  priori.  In  fact  we  should  not  have  thought  that  so  large  a 
proportion  of  children  of  normal  inteUigence  could  exist,  that  is  to 
say,  having  the  intelligence  of  their  age,  and  that  those  advanced 
or  retarded  should  form  such  a  small  minority. 

Let  us  add  a  detail;  we  speak  of  advanced  and  retarded  pupils. 
But  how  many  are  there?  There  are  86  who  are  irregular  by 
one  year;  only  a  very  limited  number,  14,  who  are  irregular 
by  two  years;  now  this  is  really  very  interesting.  The  insignifi- 
cance of  these  deviations  proves  to  us  that  the  degree  of  the  intelH- 
gence,  estimated  according  to  our  procedure,  varies  less  from  one 
subject  to  another  than  the  volume  of  the  head  or  even  the  height. 


DEFINITION   OF   INTELLIGENCE  253 

If  it  were  necessary  we  could  cite  other  verifications  of  our 
scale,  which  though  partial  seem  no  less  significant.  Often  we 
have  asked  that  the  brightest  pupil  be  sent  to  us  and  that  sub- 
ject has  always  brilliantly  passed  our  test.  On  the  contrary 
almost  all  the  subnormals,  that  is,  pupils  having  a  scholastic 
retardation  of  three  years,  show  a  serious  defect  in  intelUgence. 
Thus,  having  recently  had  to  examine  14  subnormal  pupils  who 
were  three  years  backward,  we  found  the  following  intellectual 
retardation:  —2.5,  —1,  —4,  —3.5,  —1,  —3,  —3,  —2,  —1,  —1 
-3.5,  -5,  -3.5,  -2. 

One  notices  here  a  retardation  of  intelligence  which  is  extremely 
great,  and  to  which  we  found  nothing  analogous  among  normal 
pupils.  All  these  facts  confirm  the  preceding;  they  appear  to  us 
less  convincing  than  those  which  show  the  correspondence  be- 
tween the  age  and  our  tests;  but  they  add  to  the  demonstration, 
the  force  of  individual  observations. 

III.  Apropos  of  the  Definition  of  Intelligence 

We  have  not  attempted  to  treat,  in  all  its  scope,  this  problem 
of  fearful  complexity,  the  definition  of  intelUgence;  if  we  wished 
to  take  it  in  its  entirety  we  should  be  obUged  to  present  some 
a  priori  views,  the  least  danger  of  which  would  be  to  lead  to  cer- 
tain distinctions  and  certain  subdivisions  which  might  seem 
important  to  us,  and  which  perhaps  would  not  be  so  at  all.  Our 
intention  is  altogether  different;  we  wish  to  confine  ourselves 
to  an  examination  of  the  facts  that  we  have  collected;  this  exami- 
nation compels  us  to  give  first  a  brief  definition  of  what  we  mean 
by  intelUgence,  and  further  leads  us  to  distinguish  several  forms 
of  intelligence  which  hitherto  have  been  confounded,  and  whose 
distinction  offers  a  practical  interest.  Thus  we  shall  give  no 
general  theory  of  intelligence,  but  a  detailed  examination  of 
some  special  facts  hitherto  misunderstood. 

Distinction  between  intelligence  and  scholastic  aptitude.  Let 
us  commence  with  the  easiest  distinctions.  We  have  often  said 
that  in  our  study  we  have  sought  to  find  the  natural  intelU- 
gence of  the  child,  and  not  his  degree  of  culture,  his  amount  of 
instruction. 

A  very  intelligent  child  may  be  deprived  of  instruction  by 
circumstances  foreign  to  his  intelligence.     He  may  have  Uved 


254  DEVELOPMEN'T   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

far  from  school;  he  may  have  had  a  long  illness;  or  he  may,  for 
example,  have  been  sent  to  Berck;  or  may  be  some  parents  have 
preferred  to  keep  their  children  at  home,  to  have  them  rinse 
bottles,  serve  the  customers  of  a  shop,  care  for  a  sick  relative  or 
herd  the  sheep.  In  such  cases  our  scale  teaches  us  the  degree  of 
intelUgence  that  can  be  found  among  ilHterates;  for  them  it 
suffices  to  pass  hghtly  the  results  of  tests  which  are  of  a  notably 
scholastic  character,  and  to  attach  the  greatest  importance  to 
those  which  express  the  natural  intelligence. 

Furthermore,  the  intellectual  faculty  appears  to  us  to  be  in- 
dependent not  only  of  instruction  but  of  that  which  may  be  called 
the  scholastic  faculty,  that  is  to  say,  the  faculty  of  learning  at 
school,  the  faculty  of  assimilating  the  instruction  given  in  school 
with  the  methods  used  in  school. 

We  have  shown  in  our  previous  investigation  for  the  recruiting 
of  subnormal  classes^^  that  it  was  only  by  weakness  of  the  scholas- 
tic faculty  that  we  defined  the  subnormal  at  school.  We  said: 
"Any  pupil  is  subnormal  who  is  three  years  behind  in  his  studies, 
when  that  retardation  is  not  the  result  of  lack  of  sufficient  in- 
struction." Now  it  appears  to  us  wise  and  prudent  to  admit, 
until  further  investigations  be  made,  that  this  aptitude  is  not 
necessarily  confounded  in  every  case  with  the  intellectual  faculty 
that  we  measure  by  our  method.  In  the  first  place  theoretical 
reasons  require  us  to  avoid  this  confusion.  It  seems  to  us  that 
the  scholastic  aptitude  admits  of  other  things  than  intelligence; 
to  succeed  in  his  studies,  one  must  have  qualities  which  depend 
especially  on  attention,  will,  and  character;  for  example  a  certain 
docility,  a  regularity  of  habits,  and  especially  continuity  of  effort. 
A  child,  even  if  intelligent,  will  learn  little  in  class  if  he  never 
listens,  if  he  spends  his  time  in  playing  tricks,  in  giggling,  in  play- 
ing truant.  The  lack  of  attention,  of  character,  of  will,  do  not 
appear  or  scarcely  so,  in  our  tests  of  intelligence,  the  test  is  too 
short;  the  pupil  is  not  left  to  himself  sufficiently.  In  fact,  in 
our  examinations  we  have  not  found  an  inattentive  child  except 
among  those  of  three  or  four  years.  All  make  a  good  effort; 
they  are  near  us  and  our  presence  alone  is  sufficient  to  prevent  a 
weakening  of  attention.  It  is  not  under  such  conditions  that 
one  can  measure  the  ordinary  power  of  attention  of  a  child;  it  is 
when  he  is  left  to  himself.     A  little  incident  will  serve  to  show  this. 

*^  Les  Anormaux,  one  volume  in  18  vo.,  Paris,  Colin,  1907. 


DEFINITION    OF   INTELLIGENCE  255 

Experimenters  have  long  recommended  a  test  of  attention  which 
consists  in  having  the  pupil  cross  out  certain  letters  in  a  printed 
text.  The  number  of  letters  crossed  out  correctly,  without  error 
or  omissions,  in  a  given  time,  is  taken  as  a  convenient  measure  of 
attention.  Some  want  to  see  in  this  a  dynamometer  of  attention. 
We  agree  to  it  with  this  reservation — ^that  the  pupil  be  not  left 
alone  with  the  experimenter.  Call  to  you  an  inattentive  child 
and  make  the  experiment,  you  will  not  see  much  difference  in 
the  numerical  result  between  his  work  and  that  of  a  more  atten- 
tive child.  Do  not  be  surprised.  Your  presence,  either  intimi- 
dating or  encouraging,  explains  everything.  You  have  prevented 
the  inattentive  child  from  losing. his  time;  he  has  not  dared  to 
lift  his  eyes  or  watch  the  flies  on  the  ceiling.  In  reality,  you  have 
cooperated  in  his  work,  and  the  letters  he  has  crossed  off  represent 
your  action  combined  with  his.  It  is  thus  that  we  explain  the 
entirely  negative  results  of  an  investigation  made  eighteen 
months  ago  on  some  subnormal  pupils  in  a  special  class.  We 
were  assured  in  advance  that  these  pupils  had  a  very  slight 
power  of  attention,  and  that  in  consequence  they  would  show  a 
pronounced  weakness  in  the  test  of  crossing  out  letters.  Now  it 
happened  that  these  subnormal  children  crossed  out  as  many 
letters  as  the  normal. 

Let  us  take  the  same  test,  but  under  entirely  different  con- 
ditions; let  us  have  five  children  sit  at  a  table  and  give  them  the 
same  text  to  cross  out ;  command  silence  and  leave  them  to  them- 
selves. Five  minutes  later  when  the  copies  are  taken  up  it  will 
be  seen  that  there  is  a  curious  difference,  if  one  compares  the  work 
done  by  each  child  working  without  supervision  among  his  com- 
rades, with  that  which  he  did  at  first  when  he  was  alone.  The 
attentive  child  has  resisted  the  temptation  to  distraction;  and  he 
has  been  able  to  furnish  the  same  quantity  and  quality  of  work  in 
the  two  sessions,  if  they  were  of  equal  length.  The  inattentive 
child  shows  a  decided  loss  in  the  second  effort.^^  Here  are  the 
results  in  number  of  letters  crossed: 


**  Here  are  the  exact  results  of  the  tests  made  by  one  of  us  (Binet)  with 
M.  Vaney.  There  were  17  pupils  composed  of  two  groups;  in  one,  the  at- 
tentive, the  studious,  the  disciplined ;  in  the  other,  the  inattentive,  the  un- 
stable, the  unruly.  We  had  them  cross  out  the  letters  a,  e,  d,  r,  s,  in  three 
sittings  each  one  lasting  5  minutes. 


256 


DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 


JUDGED 

NUMBER 
IN 

OF  LETTERS  CROSSED 
FIVE   MINUTES 

PUPILS 

BT  TEACHER 

JUDGED   BY   us 

In  our 
presence 

In  our 
presence 

Alone  with 

their 
comrades 

Dou 

attentive 
attentive 
attentive 
attentive 

attentive 
attentive 
inattentive 
inattentive 

200 

126 

84 

172 

166 

125 

91 

143 

164 

Gr 

118 

War 

60 

Anth 

67 

Bertr 

attentive 

inattentive 

154 

180 

56 

Bau 

attentive 
attentive 

attentive 
attentive 

144 
152 

137 
162 

140 

Dutir 

173 

Dur 

attentive 
inattentive 

attentive 
inattentive 

119 

87 

114 
102 

128 

March 

69 

Gay 

inattentive 

inattentive 

129 

157 

94 

Dast 

inattentive 

inattentive 

76 

77 

33 

Pasq 

inattentive 

inattentive 

95 

97 

38 

Coha 

inattentive 

inattentive 

116 

142 

102 

Laug 

inattentive 

inattentive 

80 

90 

48 

Plai 

inattentive 
inattentive 

inattentive 
inattentive 

71 
95 

108 
132 

56 

Barr 

55 

Blia 

inattentive 
inattentive 

inattentive 
inattentive 

47 
177 

73 

57 

Ete 

61 

-  According  as  the  figure  of  the  third  column,  expressing  the  amount  of 
work,  is  equal  to  or  less  than  the  second  figure,  we  conclude  that  the  child 
is  attentive  or  distracted;  but,  one  sees  that  out  of  17  cases,  we  were  14 
times  of  the  same  opinion  as  the  teacher. 


This  explains  to  us  that  our  examination  of  intelligence  can 
not  take  account  of  all  these  qualities,  attention,  will,  regularity, 
continuity,  docility,  and  courage  which  play  so  important  a  part 
in  school  work,  and  also  in  after-life;  for  Hfe  is  not  so  much  a 
conflict  of  intelligences  as  a  combat  of  characters.  And  we  must 
expect  in  fact  that  the  children  whom  we  judge  the  most  intelli- 
gent, will  not  always  be  those  who  are  the  most  advanced  in 
their  studies.  An  intelligent  pupil  may  be  very  lazy.  We  must 
also  notice  that  the  lack  of  intelligence  of  certain  subnormal 
pupils  does  not  account  for  their  great  retardation.  We  recall 
what  we  saw  when  we  followed  the  lesson  for  many  hours  in  a 
subnormal  class.  It  was  surprising  to  see  how  restless  they  were, 
always  ready  to  change  their  places,  to  laugh,  to  whisper,  to  pay 
no  attention  to  the  teacher.  With  such  instability  it  would  re- 
quire double  the  intelligence  of  a  normal  pupil  to  profit  from  their 


DEFINITION    OF   INTELLIGENCE  257 

lessons.  And  now  as  a  pedagogical  conclusion,  let  us  say  that 
what  they  should  learn  first  is  not  the  subjects  ordinarily  taught, 
however  important  they  may  be;  they  should  be  given  lessons  of 
will,  of  attention,  of  discipline;  before  exercises  in  grammar,  they 
need  to  be  exercised  ia  mental  orthopedy;  in  a  word  they  must 
learn  how  to  learn. ^^ 

In  summarizing  we  arrive  at  the  conception  that  if  there  is  a 
general  parallelism  between  the  scholastic  faculty  and  the  intel- 
lectual faculty,  nevertheless  some  striking  cases  of  divergence  occur. 

Do  our  tests  permit  of  this  distinction  between  the  scholastic  faculty 
and  the  intelligence?  All  the  tests  have  been  empirically  arranged, 
according  to  the  difficulties  they  present  and  from  the  best  of  our 
experiments,  in  order  to  obtain  a  good  classification  of  children. 
Many  interesting  remarks  may  be  made  on  this  subject. 

Some  of  these  remarks  are  forced  on  us  by  observations.  Thus 
there  are  some  tests  which  may  easily  be  performed  in  a  premature 
way  by  children  much  younger  than  those  to  whom  the  test 
normally  belongs.  For  example,  the  naming  of  four  colors  be- 
longs to  eight  years;  it  is  only  at  that  age  that  the  majority  of 
children  learn  the  names  of  the  colors;  however  one  sometimes 
finds  six  year  old  children  who  know  them.  The  same  is  true 
of  the  days  of  the  week  and  the  months  of  the  year.  "Usually 
it  is  only  at  nine  years  that  pupils  know  the  names  of  the  days  of 
the  week,  and  at  ten  that  they  are  able  to  repeat  the  names  of  the 
months  without  error.  However  we  have  found  at  the  Maternal 
School  many  children  of  six  years  who  knew  the  days  of  the  week. 
This  shows  that  there  are  a  certain  number  of  extra-scholastic 
attainments,  which  may  precede  the  ordinary  age  of  acquisition; 
this  is  due  to  the  fact  that  the  parents  or  the  teacher  have  had  the 
idea  of  teaching  the  child  the  names  of  the  days  and  the  months. 
Moreover  this  acquisition  does  not  demand  a  notable  effort  of 
intelligence.  One  must  take  into  account  the  extra-scholastic 
attainments  which  depend  solely  on  memory. 

Another  group  of  tests  which  may  be  passed  precociously  are 
those  which,  by  their  form  or  by  their  essence,  depend  on  the 
intelligence  alone  and  do  not  demand  the  use  nor  the  compre- 

23  We  take  pleasure  in  recording  here  that  one  of  us  with  the  devoted 
collaboration  of  the  primary  school  inspector,  M.  Belot,  has  succeeded  in 
introducing  these  exercises  of  mental  orthopedy  in  the  classes  for  sub- 
normals in  Paris,  and  even  as  an  experiment  in  a  class  of  normals. 


258  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

hension  of  a  special  vocabulary,  nor  the  concurrence  of  scholastic 
attainments.  Thus  the  arrangement  of  weights,  the  definitions 
superior  to  use,  abstract  definitions,  and  the  interpretation  of 
pictures  are  among  the  tests  which  are  most  frequently  passed 
before  age.  It  is  a  very  interesting  group;  it  is  less  influenced  than 
the  preceding  by  the  child's  surroundings  and  is  therefore  a 
more  adequate  expression  of  spontaneous  intelligence. 

A  third  group  represents  tests  which  are  generally  correct  for 
their  age,  neither  in  advance  nor  behind;  these  are  the  obviously 
scholastic  tests,  expressing  a  knowledge  that  one  acquires  at  a 
fixed  date,  or  even  the  mixed  tests  in  which  natural  intelligence 
is  combined  with  knowledge.  Thus  counting  backward  from  20 
to  0  is  an  operation  for  which  children  show  no  signs  of  precocity; 
likewise  the  number  of  facts  remembered  after  a  single  reading 
of  a  selection  depends  more  on  the  facility  of  reading  than  on  the 
extent  of  the  memory;  and  this  test  is  not  often  passed  by  chil- 
dren under  eight  years.  To  place  words  in  a  sentence  pre-sup- 
poses  a  knowledge  of  the  language  and  a  handling  of  syntax 
which  prevents  a  child's  passing  this  test  much  before  his  age. 
There  is  a  final  exercise  which  is  never  passed  before  the  age  of 
its  level,  and  that  is  the  answers  to  the  second  series  of  compre- 
hension questions,  because  they  are  not  merely  questions  of 
intelligence  since  being  intelligent  alone  does  not  suffice  to  pass 
them;  it  is  also  necessary  to  know  certain  words  of  the  vocabulary; 
there  are  certain  expressions  such  as  ''prendre  parti"  which  not 
being  understood  checks  the  most  active  intelhgence.  Now  the 
vocabulary  of  a  language  is  slowly  assimilated;  it  demands  a 
long  experience  which  cannot  be  improvised. 

In  a  last  group  we  should  place  the  tests  which  are  remarkable 
for  the  frequency  of  failures  even  when  the  pupil  is  older  than 
the  age  to  which  these  questions  normally  belong.  We  have  found 
only  one  test  to  place  in  this  category;  it  is  the  arrangement  of 
weights;  now  as  the  arrangement  of  weights  is  also  one  of  the 
tests  performed  precociously,  one  must  conclude  that  the  slight 
amount  of  cleverness  of  judgment  and  ability  to  weigh,  which 
this  test  implies,  constitutes  a  faculty  independent  of  the  whole. 

All  these  diverse  verifications  permit  us  to  judge  intelligently 
what  we  measure  with  our  measuring  scale  of  intelhgence.  We  do 
not  measure  the  intelhgence  considered  separately  from  a  number 
of  concrete  circimistances— the  intelligence  which  is  needed  for 


TWO   KINDS   OF   INTELLIGENCES  259 

understanding,  for  being  attentive,  for  judging.  It  is  something 
far  more  complex  that  we  measure.  The  result  depends:  first, 
on  the  intelligence  pure  and  simple;  second,  on  extra-scholastic 
acquisition  capable  of  being  gained  precociously;  third,  on  scholas- 
tic acquisitions  made  at  a  fixed  date;  fourth,  on  acquisitions  rela- 
tive to  language  and  vocabulary,  which  are  at  once  scholastic  and 
extra-scholastic,  depending  partly  on  the  school  and  partly  on 
the  family  circumstances. 

Does  our  measuring  scale  fail  to  do  justice  to  a  child  of  uncom- 
mon intelligence  without  culture,  or  with  a  scholastic  culture  much 
inferior  to  his  intelligence?  We  do  not  think  so.  Such  a  child 
will  show  his  superiority  in  the  re|)etition  of  figures,  in  the  repeti- 
tion of  sentences,  paper  cutting,  the  arrangement  of  weights,  the 
interpretation  of  pictures,  etc.  And  it  is  a  specially  interesting 
feature  of  these  tests  that  they  permit  us,  when  necessary,  to  free 
a  beautiful  native  intelUgence  from  the  trammels  of  the  school. 

DISTINCTION   BETWEEN   TWO   KINDS   OF   INTELLIGENCES 

It  remains  for  us  to  make  a  distinction  between  the  two  kinds  of 
intelligences  which  hitherto,  we  believe,  have  been  confounded. 
We  may  call  them  the  maturity  of  intelligence  and  the  rectitude  of 
intelligence.  The  maturity  of  intelligence  is  the  growth  of  the 
intelligence  with  age.  An  intelligence  which  is  not  mature  is 
childish;  an  intelligence  which  is  mature  before  the  age  of  maturity 
is  precocious.  These  phenomena  of  retardation  or  advancement 
are  especially  noticeable  when  produced  in  the  character.  Every 
one  has  seen  intelligent  persons  whose  characters  remain  childish; 
old  ladies  who  simper,  who  show  affectation,  who  shed  torrents  of 
tears  on  the  death  of  a  canary;  men  of  fifty  who  have  the  humor 
for  practical  jokes,  and  who  enjoy  playing  the  clown.  One  knows 
less  of  the  maturity  of  the  intelligence  and  it  is  this  which  appears 
in  our  work.  In  fact,  it  is  this  maturity  mingled  with  many  other 
elements  that  we  have  especially  studied.  In  what  does  it  really 
consist?  It  consists  in  part,  in  the  increase  of  the  faculty  of  com- 
prehending and  of  judging,  at  least  this  is  probable;  a  child  under- 
stands less  and  judges  with  less  penetration  than  an  adult;  it  con- 
sists also  in  the  increase  of  acquisitions  of  every  sort.  But  these 
are  perhaps  secondary  characteristics  which  one  may  lack  with- 
out compromising  his  maturity.     We  beheve  that  this  is  brought 


260  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

out  in  3  or  4  tests  which  certainly  were  not  designed  for  that  pur- 
pose. These  tests  are  definitions,  the  work  on  pictures,  the  con- 
struction of  sentences  containing  3  words  and  perhaps  also  the 
arranging  of  weights.  Let  us  return  to  the  analysis  we  have  made 
of  these  tests;  in  the  results  which  have  been  recorded,  it  is  easy 
to  see  in  what  the  range  of  a  child's  thought  consists.  For  the 
definition,  it  is  the  strictly  utilitarian  point  of  view;  he  does  not 
go  outside  of  himself  and  he  views  objects  in  their  relation  to  him- 
self. For  the  pictures,  it  is  the  act  of  enumeration  to  which  he 
Kmits  himself.  For  the  construction  of  sentences,  it  is  the  pro- 
duction of  three  different  ideas,  without  power  of  synthesis.  For 
the  comparison  of  two  weights,  it  is  the  contrast  between  the  diffi- 
culty of  understanding  that  one  ought  to  compare,  and  the  rapidity 
with  which  one  estimates  the  difference  of  two  weights.  For  the 
arranging  of  weights  it  is  something  analogous,  the  difficulty  of 
understanding  and  keeping  in  mind  the  fact  that  the  weights, 
should  be  arranged  in  decreasing  order,  and  the  facihty  of  compar- 
ing them  two  by  two.  Those  are  some  of  the  traits  of  child  intel- 
ligence. Let  us  add  that  the  child  is  equal  to  the  adult  in  simple, 
but  not  in  reasoned,  memory,  and  in  fine  perception,  but  not  in 
reflective  perceptions.  But  it  would  require  a  study  much  more 
vast  than  ours,  and  above  all  more  specialized,  to  set  forth  all 
the  traits  of  a  child's  intellectual  physiognomy.' 

The  maturity  of  intelligence  is  very  distinct  from  the  rectitude 
of  intelligence,  and  the  proof  is  that  there  exist  very  plain  exam- 
ples, already  cited  by  us,  where  the  intelligence  has  maturity 
without  rectitude.  Thus  a  pupil  of  twelve  years  succeeds  in 
uniting  in  one  sentence  the  three  words  given  him,  but  the  sen- 
tence is  meaningless;  he  has  maturity,  not  rectitude.  Another, 
a  true  adult,  a  man  of  twenty-four,  a  veritable  block-head— to 
quote  his  companions— gives  us  the  interpretation  of  a  picture, 
but  his  interpretation  is  remarkably  false.  To  interpret  is  to 
have  maturity;  to  make  gross  errors  is  to  lack  rectitude. 

The  same  distinction  is  also  observable  when  one  compares  the 
answers  to  the  tests  of  intelligence  given  by  the  subnormal  with 
those  of  normal  pupils.  Let  us  take  for  example,  without  choos- 
ing, 13  subnormals  of  nine  to  twelve  years,  whose  intellectual  re- 
tardation varies  from  one  to  four  years.  The  absurdities  com- 
mitted by  these  in  their  answers  reach  the  following  numbers  per 
child:  9,  3,  5,  3,  2,  2,  2,  7,  4,  4,  0,  1,  L    With  this  series, let  us  com- 


THE    USE    OF   THE   SCALE  261 

pare  those  of  normal  pupils  aged  nine  years;  their  absurdities  are 
far  less  in  number;  0,  2,  1,  0,  0,  0,  0,  1,  0,  0.  The  average  of  ab- 
surd mistakes  for  the  subnormal  would  be  3,  for  the  normal 
scarcely  0.5.  A  very  sensible  difference  which  shows  us,  be  it 
said  in  passing,  that  what  is  lacking  in  the  subnormal  is  not  only 
the  maturity  of  intelligence  (which  is  doubtless  also  lacking,  for 
they  are  constantly  retarded)  but  also  the  rectitude  of  intelli- 
gence. We  limit  ourselves  for  the  present  to  formulating  these 
remarks;  they  are  stepping-stones. 

Other  traits  of  childish  intelligence  must  also  be  studied  so  as 
to  discover  if  in  certain  cases,  the  lack  of  rectitude  does  not  also 
result  from  lack  of  maturity. 

IV.     The  Use  of  the  Measuring  Scale  of  Intelligence   ^ 

Our  principal  conclusion  is  that  we  actually  possess  an  instru- 
ment which  allows  us  to  measure  the  intellectual  development  of 
young  children  whose  age  is  included  between  three  and  twelve 
years.  This  method  appears  to  us  practical,  convenient  and 
rapid.  If  one  wishes  to  know  summarily  whether  a  child  has  the 
intelligence  of  his  age,  or  if  he  is  advanced  or  retarded,  it  suffices 
to  have  him  take  the  tests  of  his  age;  and  the  performance  of  these 
tests  certainly  does  not  require  more  than  thirty  minutes  which 
should  be  interrupted  by  ten  minutes  rest  if  one  thinks  this  neces- 
sary for  the  child. 

Furthermore  when  one  wishes  to  be  more  precise,  or  to  make  a 
closer  approximation,  one  may  make  many  more  tests;  if  the  child 
is  seven  years  old,  he  may  attempt  the  tests  of  eight,  nine  and  ten 
years  for  example.  One  would  also  be  able  after  an  interval  of 
several  days  to  substitute  analogous  tests. 

One  question  remains  to  be  examined.  To  what  purpose  are 
these  studies?  In  reading  the  reflections  which  we  have  inter- 
spersed in  the  course  of  our  treatise,  it  will  be  seen  that  a  profound 
knowledge  of  the  normal  intellectual  development  of  the  child 
would  not  only  be  of  great  interest  but  useful  in  formulating  a 
course  of  instruction  really  adapted  to  their  aptitudes.  We  fear 
that  those  who  have  drawn  up  the  programs  actually  in  force,  are 
educated  men  who  in  their  work  have  been  led  more  by  the  fancies 
of  their  imaginations  than  by  well-grounded  principles.  The 
pedagogical  principle  which  ought  to  inspire  the  authors  of  pro- 


262  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

grams  seems  to  us  to  be  the  following :  the  instruction  should  al- 
ways be  according  to  the  natural  evolution  of  the  child,  and  not 
precede  it  by  a  year  or  two.  In  other  words  the  child  should  be 
*  taught  only  what  he  is  sufficiently  mature  to  understand ;  all  pre- 
cocious instruction  is  lost  time,  for  it  is  not  assimilated.  We  have 
cited  an  example  of  it  in  regard  to  the  date,  which  is  taught  in  the 
Maternal  School,  but  which  is  not  known  and  assimilated  before 
the  age  of  nine  years.  This  is  only  one  example,  but  it  is  eloquent; 
it  shows  the  error  of  what  has  hitherto  been  done;  it  suggests  a 
method  which  will  enable  us  to  improve  upon  the  past, — a  method 
less  literary,  less  rapid,  and  even  extremely  laborious,  for  it  de- 
mands that  one  establish  by  careful  investigations  the  normal 
evolution  of  a  child's  intelligence,  in  order  to  make  all  our  programs 
and  methods  of  instruction  conform  to  that  evolution,  when  it  is 
once  known.  If  by  this  labor  we  have  succeeded  in  showing  the 
necessity  for  a  thorough  investigation  conducted  after  this  plan, 
our  time  has  not  been  lost.  But  we  are  far  from  flattering  our- 
selves that  we  have  inaugurated  a  reform.  Reforms  in  France  do 
not  succeed  except  through  politics,  and  we  cannot  readily  im- 
agine a  secretary  of  state  busying  himself  with  a  question  of  this 
kind.  What  is  taught  to  children  at  school !  As  though  legislators 
could  become  interested  in  that! 

It  now  remains  to  explain  the  use  of  our  measuring  scale  which 
we  consider  a  standard  of  the  child's  intelligence.  Of  what  use 
is  a  measure  of  inteUigence?  Without  doubt  one  could  conceive 
many  possible  apphcations  of  the  process,  in  dreaming  of  a  future 
where  the  social  sphere  would  be  better  organized  than  ours; 
where  every  one  would  work  according  to  his  known  aptitudes  in 
such  a  way  that  no  particle  of  psychic  force  should  be  lost  for 
society.  That  would  be  the  ideal  city.  It  is  indeed  far  from  us. 
But  we  have  to  remain  among  the  sterner  and  the  matter-of-fact 
realities  of  hf e,  since  we  here  deal  with  practical  experiments  which 
are  the  most  commonplace  realities. 

We  shall  not  speak  of  parents;  although  a  father  and  mother 
who  raise  a  child  themselves,  who  watch  over  him  and  study  him 
fondly,  would  have  great  satisfaction  in  knowing  that  the  intelli- 
gence of  a  child  can  be  measured,  and  would  willingly  make  the 
necessary  effort  to  find  out  if  their  own  child  is  intelligent.  We 
think  especially  of  teachers  who  love  their  profession,  who  inter- 
est themselves  in  their  pupils,  and  who  understand  that  the  first 


THE   USE    OF   THE    SCALE  263 

condition  of  instructing  them  well,  is  to  know  them.  All  such 
teachers  seek,  more  or  less  successfully,  to  make  an  estimate  of 
the  intelligence  of  their  pupils;  but  they  have  no  method,  and  in 
the  normal  schools  the  courses  in  psychology  are  generally  so 
antiquated,  that  one  cannot  learn  there  how  to  observe  mental 
phenomena.  Primary  School  inspectors  have  often  told  us  of 
zealous  teachers  who  have  had  the  ingenious  idea  of  compos- 
ing psychological  portraits  of  their  pupils,  and  we  have  looked 
over  these  collections  of  portraits  with  interest.  We  have  con- 
gratulated and  encouraged  the  authors  without  telling  them 
frankly  what  we  thought,  which  was  that  they  were  working  with- 
out method,  like  a  very  intelligent  but  unscientific  man  who  would 
try  experiments  in  bacteriology  with  unclean  tools. 

It  seems  that  the  simplest  process  that  comes  to  the  mind  of 
an  instructor,  when  he  wishes  to  elucidate  intellectual  character- 
istics, would  be  to  interest  himself  in  every  one  of  his  pupils  and 
to  apply  to  each  one  separately  all  the  information  he  has  gleaned 
here  and  there.  Seeking  to  make  a  study,  of  which  he  expects 
an  individual  application,  he  confines  himself  to  the  individual. 
That  appears  very  logical,  very  simple.  One  proposes  to  himself 
a  goal  and  runs  thither  directly.  But  in  the  sciences  the  straight 
line  is  not  always  the  shortest  road.  Even  when  one  seeks  only 
the  individual  application,  it  would  be  better  to  make  a  detour, 
and  go  from  the  individual  to  the  general  in  order  to  come  back  to 
the  individual.  This  is  the  precise  point  that  our  instructors 
have  not  understood,  the  route  that  they  have  not  found,  or  which, 
after  entering,  they  have  not  followed,  deeming  it  too  long.  In 
consequence  their  investigations  profit  them  alone;  they  remain 
empirical  and  arbitrary.  In  any  case,  we  offer  them  our  method 
which  has  been  built  on  particular  facts  generalized,  and  which  in 
consequence  might  and  should  render  service  to  everyone.  We 
are  certain  in  advance  that  many  instructors  will  desire  to  make 
use  of  it.  Some  having  witnessed  our  experiments,  and  being 
charmed  by  what  they  saw,  have  already  commenced  its  use. 

But  we  are  of  the  opinion  that  the  most  valuable  use  of  our 
scale  will  not  be  its  application  to  the  normal  pupils,  but  rather^ 
to  those  of  inferior  grades  of  intelligence. 

It  is  well  known,  as  we  have  often  afiirmed,  that  the  alienists 
are  not  agreed  on  the  definitions  of  the  words  idiot,  imbecile  and 
moron.     There  are  as  many  definitions  as  writers.     Moreover  the 


264  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

formulae  employed  and  the  processes  of  diagnosis  in  use,  are  so 
vague  that  the  most  conscientious  author  is  not  sure  of  remaining 
constantly  consistent  with  himself.  How,  for  instance,  can  one 
make  use  of  formulae  of  diagnosis,  founded  on  difference  of  de- 
gree, when  these  differences  are  not  measured?^*  ^  Finally,  the 
most  serious  criticisms  that  one  can  make  of  the  actual  medical 
practice  is  that  if  by  chance,  a  child  of  normal  intelligence  were 
presented  at  a  clinic,  the  alienist  would  not  be  able  to  know  that 
he  is  dealing  with  a  normal  child.  He  will  be  unable  for  a  very 
simple  reason;  he  does  not  know  what  is  necessary  in  order  for  a 
child  to  be  normal ;  let  us  add  that  everyone  is  equally  ignorant  of 
how  an  individual  intelligence  can  be  studied  and  measured. 
This  is  then  a  consequence  of  much  weight.  The  doctor  suspects 
every  child  who  is  brought  to  a  mental  clinic  of  being  backward, 
and  if,  by  chance,  he  is  not  at  all  backward,  the  alienist  will  not 
know  it;  he  will  not  even  have  the  means  of  finding  out. 

But  one  will  say:  You  are  making  objections  built  on  purely 
theoretical  cases,  cases  possible,  but  invented  at  pleasure  to  sus- 
tain a  thesis,  cases  which  in  reaUty  have  never  been  presented. 
You  do  not  know  an  example  of  an  error  so  great.  It  is  true,  we 
answer,  that  a  certain  number  of  children  who  are  brought  to  the 
asylum  either  by  parents  or  by  officers,  are  so  noticeably  deficient 
that  there  is  no  need  to  be  a  doctor  to  recognize  that  they  are  not 
normal.    When  a  boy  of  seven  years  does  not  know  how  to  dress 

2*  We  should  never  cease  to  criticize  these  absurd  formulas,  which  are 
to  be  met  with  in  the  best  authors.  In  the  idiot,  we  are  told,  the  intelli- 
gence is  but  little  developed,  it  is  a  little  more  so  in  the  imbecile.  Conscien- 
tious physicians  have  lately  published  statistics  of  slightly  feeble-minded 
and  profoundly  feeble-minded,  which  were  made  in  primary  schools ;  they 
seriously  give  figures  of  percentages.  There  are  so  many  slightly  feeble- 
minded, they  tell  us,  so  many  profoundly  feeble-minded.  But  by  what 
controllable  and  precise  sign,  can  we  distinguish  such  a  slightness  from 
such  a  depth?  Not  a  word!  It  is  about  as  if  we  said  that  there  are  in 
Paris  43  per  cent  of  tall  men  and  42  per  cent  of  short  men,  without  defining 
what  we  were  to  consider  tall  or  what  short.  It  is  as  if  the  military  law 
decided  that  to  be  passed,  the  recruit  must  have  a  reasonable  height.  How 
arbitrary!  And  how  comical  when  these  vague  notions  are  accompanied 
with  figures !  We  cannot  be  blamed  if  in  the  presence  of  these  grave  med- 
ical statistics,  we  irresistibly  think  of  Moliere. 

Editor's  Note:  The  famous  comedies  of  Moliere  are  here  alluded  to  in 
which  the  ridiculous  pretensions  of  the  doctors  are  made  the  occasions  of 
mirth  "Le  medicin  malgr6  lui,"  "Le  malade  imaginaire,"  etc. 


THE   USE   OF   THE   SCALE  265 

himself,  when  he  does  not  understand  a  sentence,  when  he  drivels, 
he  would  be  recognized  as  feeble-minded  by  the  first  attendant 
who  passed  him. 

But  besides  these  cases  so  evidently  feeble-minded,  one  meets 
others  whose  deficiency  is  much  less  noticeable,  and  whose  diag- 
nosis must  l)e  much  more  delicate. 

During  the  past  year  one  of  us  examined  25  children  who  for 
various  reasons  had  been  admitted  to  Sainte-Anne  and  later  con- 
fined at  the  Bicetre,  at  Salpetri^re,  or  at  other  places.  We  appUed 
the  procedure  of  our  measuring  scale  to  all  these  children,  and  thus 
proved  that  three  of  them  were  at  age  in  intelligence,  and  two  others 
were  a  year  advanced  beyond  the  average. 

On  reflection,  these  cases  should  not  surprise  us;  and  it  is  not 
necessary  to  be  in  touch  with  questions  of  mental  medicine  fco 
inveigh  against  arbitrary  segregation.  One  ought  to  confine  a 
child  of  normal  intelligence,  or  even  of  super-normal,  if  he  has 
epilepsy,  or  irresistible  impulses  which  constitute  a  danger  to  his 
neighbors  or  to  himself.  But  it  is  none  the  less  true  that  the  doc- 
tors who  were  obliged  to  diagnose  these  cases,  have  had  to  judge 
the  degree  of  intelligence  of  these  children;  it  is  very  interesting 
to  show  the  errors  of  diagnosis  which  have  been  committed  in  this 
regard.  To  two  of  these  children  who  showed  normal  intelli- 
gence we  regret  to  say  that  the  term  mental  debility  had  been  ap- 
pHed  without  consideration.  The  third  had  received  the  term, 
truly  extraordinary  of  its  kind,  of  "enfant  idiot.^'  The  child  was 
named  T ,  aged  seven  years.  A  doctor  had  written  concern- 
ing him,  ''Idiotic,  with  attacks  of  furious  anger.  Wishes  to 
bite.  Does  not  know  how  to  read  or  write."  This  last  is  a  little 
too  naive.     Since  the  normal  child  does  not  know  how  to  read  and 

write  at  seven  years,  to  be  astonished  that  T who  is  just 

seven  is  still  illiterate,  is  like  reproaching  a  three  year  old  baby  for 
not  knowing  how  to  play  the  piano.  Finally,  one  of  these  chil- 
dren who  was  a  year  in  advance,  was  classed  as  a  moron;  and  as 
to  the  other  nothing  was  said  concerning  his  mentality.  Nothing 
could  show  more  clearly,  that  with  the  means  which  it  has  at  its 
command,  the  mental  clinic  is  not  in  a  position  to  diagnose  cor- 
rectly a  child's  intelligence.^^ 

'"  We  cite  this  fact  for  the  benefit  of  M.  Royer,  interne  of  M.  Bourneville, 
who  took  upon  himself  to  inveigh  against  our  last  book,  Les  Enfants 
Anormaux, 


266  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

Let  US  show  in  what  practical  manner  one  ought  to  utiHze  our 
scale.  Two  cases  are  to  be  distinguished:  the  backward  adult 
and  the  backward  child.  Let  us  begin  with  the  simpler  of  these 
cases  which  is  the  first. 

We  shall  use  the  customary  words  idiot,  imbecile,  and  moron, 
giving  to  them  a  precise  definition  and  a  possible  application  by 
means  of  the  tests  of  our  scale.  An  idiot  is  a  person  who  cannot 
communicate  with  his  fellows  by  means  of  language;  he  does  not 
speak  and  does  not  understand;  he  corresponds  to  the  level  of 
normal  intelHgence  between  birth  and  the  age  of  two  years.  To 
estabhsh  a  differential  diagnosis  between  the  idiot  and  the  imbecile 
it  suffices  to  employ  the  following  tests:  first,  to  give  verbal 
orders  like  touching  the  nose,  mouth,  eyes;  second,  to  have  him 
name  some  easy  familiar  obj  ects  that  he  can  find  and  point  out  in 
a  picture.  These  are  our  tests  for  the  age  of  three  years;  in  reality 
they  belong  as  much  to  two  years  as  to  three. 

The  border  line  between  imbecility  and  moronity  is  not  more 
difficult  to  establish.  An  imbecile  is  a  person  who  is  incapable 
of  communicating  with  his  fellows  by  means  of  written  language; 
he  can  neither  read,  nor  understand  what  he  reads,  nor  write  from 
dictation  nor  write  spontaneously  in  an  intelligible  manner.  To 
him  may  be  applied  the  tests  for  eight  years.  As  it  is  possible 
that  one  may  sometimes  have  to  deal  with  a  person  who  is  illit- 
erate through  lack  of  schooling,  one  would  need  to  employ  many 
other  tests  of  seven  and  eight  years;  the  description  of  pictures, 
the  counting  of  mixed  coins,  the  comparison  of  two  objects  from 
memory;  these  supplementary  tests  define  the  boundary  which 
separates  imbecility  and  moronity. 

There  remains  a  third  limit  to  establish — that  which  separates 
moronity  from  the  normal  state.  This  is  more  complicated;  we  do 
not  consider  it  fixed  but  variable  according  to  circumstances.  The 
most  general  formula  that  one  can  adopt  is  this :  an  individual  is 
normal  when  he  is  able  to  conduct  himself  in  life  without  need  of  the 
guardianship  of  another,  and  is  able  to  perform  work  sufficiently 
remunerative  to  supply  his  personal  needs,  and  finally  when  his  in- 
telligence does  not  exclude  him  from  the  social  rank  of  his  parents. 
As  a  result  of  this,  an  attorney's  son  who  is  reduced  by  his  intelH- 
gence to  the  condition  of  a  menial  employee  is  a  moron;  likewise  the 
son  of  a  master  mason,  who  remains  a  servant  at  thirty  years  is  a 
moron;  hkewise  a  peasant,  normal  in  ordinary  surroundings  of  the 


THE   USE   OF  THE  SCALE  267 

fields,  may  be  considered  a  moron  in  the  city.  In  a  word,  retardation 
is  a  term  relative  to  a  number  of  circumstances  which  must  be  taken 
into  account  in  order  to  judge  each  particular  case.  We  can  make 
the  boundary  between  moronity  and  the-  normal  state  more  defi- 
nite by  considering  a  special  category  of  subjects.  We  wish  to 
speak  of  defective  adults  whom  we  have  had  occasion  to  observe 
in  the  Parisian  hospitals  who  were  subjects  for  custodial  care. 
This  forms  a  special  category  for  many  reasons:  first  on  account 
of  nationality  and  race,  it  is  a  question  as  to  whether  they  are 
Parisians  or  persons  living  in  the  region  of  Paris;  second,  on  ac- 
count of  social  condition;  all  belong  to  the  laboring  class.  The 
limit  that  we  place  for  them  wouM  not  be  correct  for  any  others; 
we  express  complete  reserve  for  the  application  of  it  which  one 
would  wish  to  make  for  subjects  of  different  environments. 

In  making  a  detailed  study  of  the  intellectual  faculties  of  20 
of  these  inmates,  we  found  that  the  best  endowed  did  not  surpass 
the  normal  level  of  nine  or  ten  years,  and  in  consequence  our  meas- 
uring scale  furnished  us  something  by  which  to  raise  before  them 
a  barrier  that  they  could  never  pass.  There  is  always  a  reserva- 
tion to  be  made  in  applying  our  scale  to  them,  which  was  pre- 
pared exclusively  from  observations  upon  young  persons.  Some 
of  our  tests  consist  of  the  usual  knowledge  that  children  acquire 
somewhat  late.  Thus  the  names  of  the  days,  of  the  months,  of 
colors,  of  the  principal  pieces  of  money,  are  notions  that  an  ordi- 
nary child  does  not  possess  before  the  age  of  eight,  nine  or  ten. 
A  defective  adult  even  of  inferior  degree,  for  example  an  imbecile 
of  forty,  who  is  in  general  of  the  mental  level  of  five  years,  may 
often  recite  without  a  mistake  the  names  of  the  days,  months, 
colors,  pieces  of  money,  and  even  the  playing  cards.  From  this 
point  of  view  he  is  certainly  much  superior  to  the  child  of  five 
years,  and  the  reason  is  that  he  has  profited  by  an  experience  very 
much  longer.  Let  us  then  lay  aside  these  practical  notions  which 
have  no  bearing  here.  There  remain  six  or  seven  fundamental 
tests  uniquely  expressive  of  the  intelligence;  these  are  the  tests 
that  may  be  considered  as  forming  for  the  laboring  class  of  Paris 
and  its  environs  the  border  line  between  moronity  and  the  normal 
state.  These  tests  are:  first,  arrangement  of  weights;  second, 
answers  to  questions  difficult  of  comprehension;  third,  the  con- 
struction of  a  sentence  containing  three  given  words;  fourth,  the 
definition  of  abstract  terms;  fifth,  the  interpretation  of  pictures; 


268  DEVELOPMENT    OF   INTELLIGENCE 

sixth,  the  making  of  rh5Tiies.  Our  subjects  in  the  hospital  were 
able  to  pass  some  of  these  tests  but  not  one  could  pass  all,  nor  even 
three  of  them.  Now  this  is  not  a  special  localized  success  which  is 
important  for  diagnosing  a  level  of  intelligence.  All  our  work  has 
shown  that  intelligence  is  measured  by  a  synthesis  of  results.  We 
hope  then  that  we  are  not  dangerously  precise  in  admitting  that 
the  six  preceding  tests  will  apprehend  all  feeble-minded  adults; 
and  that  one  who  can  pass  the  majority  of  them,  or  at  least  four, 
is  normal.  For  us  every  subject  from  the  laboring  class  of  the 
region  of  Paris  is  normal  if  he  has  satisfied  the  condiaon  of  this 
examination  of  inteUigence;  however,  the  examination  shows  only 
that  he  has  intelhgence  enough  to  live  outside  of  an  institution, 
and  that  intelligence  may  coexist  with  accentuated  instability,  or 
with  irresistible  impulses,  or  even  with  other  pathological  symp- 
toms grave  enough  to  necessitate  his  segregation. 

The  mental  level  of  a  backward  person  having  been  deter- 
mined, one  may  conjecture  what  advantages  can  be  drawn  from 
the  medico-pedagogical  treatment  of  the  person,  and  what  progress 
can  be  attributed  to  that  treatment.  It  has  sometimes  been  pro- 
posed to  treat  the  drowsy  class  of  subnormals  with  thyroidine, 
and  those  who  have  recommended  this  new  medication  have  pro- 
nounced its  results  marvelous.  Instead  however  of  allowing  one's 
self  to  be  too  optimistic,  or  of  relying  upon  the  statements  of 
hypnotized  relatives,  it  would  be  much  simpler  to  take  a  measure 
of  the  intelhgence  before  and  after  treatment.  That  would  be  a 
means  for  ascertaining  once  for  all  what  is  the  value  of  the  famous 
medico-pedagogical  treatment  of  defectives,  so  lyrically  chanted 
by  certain  alienists,  and  in  which  the  pedagogue  sees  only  certain 
procedures  which  are  themselves  very  defective. ^^ 

Other  investigations  which  are  a  Httle  different,  will  be  equally 
aided  by  the  measure  of  intelligence;  thus  the  cephalometric  study 
of  the  relation  of  the  mental  functions  with  the  cranium  develop- 
ment, will  gain  in  value  when  one  knows  how  to  make  an  accurate 
measure  of  intelligence.     Autopsies  will  become  more  eloquent 

2«  It  is  interesting  to  note  that  according  to  SolUer,  who  published  a 
special  study  on  the  medico-pedagogical  treatment  of  idiocy,  there  does 
not  exist  any  medical  treatment  of  the  idiot,  and  the  pedagogical  processes 
of  Bic^tre  are  "very  little  different  from  the  education  of  normal  children." 
(Sollier,  in  Traite  de  ThSrapeutique  appliqu^e:  Treatment  of  Mental  Dis- 
p.  258). 


THE   USE    OF   THE    SCALE  269 

when  the  anatomo-pathologic  study  of  the  brain  will  be  made 
clear  by  a  study  of  the  quantitative  psychology  which  will  have 
been  made  on  the  living  subject.  Let  us  content  ourselves  with 
these  allusions.  We  shall  elsewhere  return  to  the  consequence  of 
the  diagnosis  of  inferior  states  of  intelHgence  among  adults;  and 
we  shall  show  how  the  diagnosis  may  be  perfected  by  the 
establishment  of  many  sub-degrees  of  idiocy,  imbecihty  and 
moronity. 

Let  us  pass  to  cases  where  the  backward  subject  is  young  and 
in  the  course  of  mental  development;  the  subject  to  be  studied 
is  eight  years  old. 

The  problem  is  complex;  one  is  unwilling  to  class  the  child,  as 
if  he  were  an  adult,  in  a  special  group  of  defectives,  without  taking 
account  of  his  age,  and  of  all  which  that  age  permits  him  to  attain. 
If  he  is  eight  years  old  we  have  not  the  right  to  consider  him  an 
imbecile  simply  because  he  does  not  know  how  to  read;  a  normal 
child  of  eight  years  does  not  read  very  well,  and  one  would  never 
have  the  temptation  to  class  him  as  an  imbecile.  To  establish 
the  diagnosis  of  the  subnormal  child  we  must  take  into  account 
two  elements;  his  age  and  his  intellectual  level. 

But  how  combine  these  two  elements?  We  shall  not  know  with 
certainty  until  an  extensive  experience  will  have  taught  us  what 
we  do  not  yet  know;  how  do  idiots,  imbeciles  and  morons  develop; 
and  what  prognosis  can  be  made  from  a  certain  retarded  condition 
at  a  certain  age?  These  are  investigations  of  prime  importance 
though  hitherto  impracticable,  since  empiricism  was  the  only 
method,  and  consequently  there  was  no  way  of  measuring  the 
mental  development  of  the  feeble-minded. 

The  process  that  we  now  recommend  may  be  only  provisional. 
We  have  sought  to  render  it  as  simple  as  possible.  In  examining 
the  table  of  our  experiments  upon  normal  pupils,  one  will  notice 
that  an  intellectual  retardation  of  one  year  is  so  frequent  that  it 
becomes  insignificant;  one  need  attach  no  particular  value  to  it. 
On  the  contrary  a  retardation  of  two  years  is  rare  enough;  it  is 
found  only  in  the  proportion  of  7  to  100.  Let  us  admit  that  this 
retardation  has  in  itself  a  prejudicial  significance;  let  us  admit 
that  every  time  it  occurs,  the  question  may  be  raised  as  to  whether 
the  child  is  subnormal,  and  in  what  category  he  should  be  placed. 
The  first  determination  being  made,  and  its  extreme  faciHty  is 
evident,  the  child  is  placed  in  the  category  to  which  he  belongs 


270  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

by  actual  development.  Thus  idiocy  corresponds  to  a  devel- 
opment of  from  0  to  2 years;  imbecility  from  2  to  7 years;  moronity 
begins  at  8  years. 

Whenever  one  deducts  the  retardation  of  a  child  from  his  real  age 

he  falls  into  one  of  these  categories.     For  example  the  child  B , 

who  is  seven  years  old,  and  five  years  behind  the  normal  grade, 
presenting  in  consequence  the  development  of  a  two  year  old 

child,  is  found  at  the  limit  between  idiocy  and  imbecility;  Br , 

who  is  thirteen  years  of  age  and  seven  years  behind  has  in  conse- 
quence a  development  of  six  years,  and  is  an  imbecile  who  ap- 
proaches the  limit  of  moronity.     Lay ,  who  is  nine  years  old, 

is  four  years  behind,  and  has  a  five  year  development;  she  is 
plainly  in  the  class  of  imbecihty. 

It  is  understood  that  these  diagnoses  apply  only  to  the  present 
moment.  One  who  is  imbecile  today,  may  by  the  progress  of  age 
become  a  moron,  or  on  the  contrary  remain  an  imbecile  all  his 
life.     One  knows  nothing  of  that;  the  prognosis  is  reserved. 

There  is  a  third  class  of  subnormals  of  which  it  remains  for  us 
to  speak;  these  are  the  subnormals  in  the  school.  They  differ 
from  the  subnormals  in  institutions  only  by  a  less  accentuated 
state  of  backwardness  or  of  instability.  We  could  then  limit 
ourselves  to  saying  that  the  same  methods  of  diagnosis  are  ap- 
plicable to  them  as  to  the  subnormals  in  institutions,  if  the  neces- 
sity of  entrusting  the  selecting  of  them  to  persons  who  are  not 
professional  aUenists  did  not  oblige  us  to  simpHfy  the  procedure 
they  are  to  make  use  of  in  order  to  recognize  them  in  the  crowd  of 
normal  school  children  among  whom  they  are  placed.  In  a  recent 
work  we  have  given  a  very  practical  definition  of  a  subnormal,  in 
stating  that  it  is  one  who  is  three  years  behind  in  his  studies  with- 
out the  excuse  of  having  been  frequently  absent  from  school. 

That  formula  is  usually  sufficient  to  guide  the  pedagogic  diag- 
nosis; but  it  sometimes  happens  that  one  lacks  information  on 
the  scholarship  of  a  child,  especially  if  he  comes  from  a  parochial 
school,  or  if  he  has  passed  successively  through  different  public 
schools  where  he  remained  only  a  short  time.  In  this  case  the 
examiner  must  estabhsh  the  value  of  his  retardation;  but  one  hesi- 
tates at  the  interpretation  of  this  retardation,  and  questions  if  it 
is  by  fault  of  scholarship  or  by  fault  of  intelligence  that  he  has 
been  retarded.  The  intellectual  test  allows  us  to  avoid  all  doubt, 
and  we  habitually  resort  to  it  when  it  is  the  question  of  a  candidate 
for  a  special  class. 


THE   USE   OF   THE   SCALE  271 

Evidently,  let  us  say  it  in  the  most  emphatic  manner,  our  test 
of  intelligence  will  not  suffice  to  know  absolutely  that  a  child  is 
subnormal;  we  have  shown  above,  with  an  example  for  the  sup- 
port of  the  theory,  that  one  may  be  among  the  less  brilHant  in  the 
test  of  intelligence  and  yet  follow  the  course  of  study  for  his  age 
at  school;  when  one  is  able  to  follow  the  course  of  study  for  his 
age,  he  is  saved  from  a  suspicion  of  backwardness.  We  consider 
only  a  situation  where  there  are  doubts  on  the  causes  of  scholastic 
backwardness;  and  in  such  a  case,  if  to  a  serious  retardation  of 
scholarship  is  added  a  serious  intellectual  retardation,  there  is 
sufficient  reason  for  sending  the  pupil  to  a  special  class.  Thus 
in  a  recent  study,  we  have  examined  some  twenty  children  who 
had  been  proposed  by  their  teachers  for  that  class;  the  information 
in  regard  to  their  scholarship  seemed  to  us  vague  for  the  majority 
of  them.  Three  of  the  candidates  were  but  one  year  behind;  we 
sent  those  to  an  ordinary  school,  and  sent  to  the  special  class  only 
those  who  were  two  or  more  years  retarded. 

One  of  these  cases,  to  us  a  very  striking  one,  was  that  of  little 
Germaine,  a  child  of  eleven  years  who  came  from  a  Paris  school. 
Her  parents,  having  carried  their  Penates  to  Levallois-Perret,  had 
sent  their  child  to  one  of  the  schools  for  girls  in  that  city.  But 
the  directress  refused  httle  Germaine  under  the  pretext  that  her 
school  was  full;  in  reality  because  the  child  was  extremely  back- 
ward. In  fact  the  retardation  was  at  least  three  years;  her  read- 
ing was  hesitating,  almost  syllabic;  faults  of  orthography  spoiled 
her  dictation  exercise.  She  wrote  the  following  phrase  under  our 
eyes:  The  pertly  litl  grils  stude  the  flwr  that  the  gathrd  yesty 
(which  signifies:  The  pretty  little  girls  studied  the  flowers  that 
they  gathered  yesterday).  Her  number  work  was  equally  poor. 
She  was  asked,  *'If  I  have  19  apples,  and  eat  6  of  them,  how  many 
have  I  left?"  The  child,  reckoning  mentally,  said  "  12"  which  is 
inexact  but  reasonable.  Trying  it  on  paper,  she  was  lost;  she 
made  an  addition  instead  of  subtraction  and  found  25.  In  other 
alculations  she  showed  that  she  had  the  power  to  reckon  mentally, 
ut  not  on  paper;  in  the  last  case  she  made  the  addition  correctly 
when  she  should  have  subtracted.  It  is  however  a  frequent,  not 
to  say  constant  rule  that  those  backward  in  arithmetic  do  the 
operations  better  than  the  problems,  and  do  more  easily  opera- 
tions of  addition  and  multiplication  than  those  of  subtraction 
and  division.     In  short,  this  child  had  a  retardation  of  three 


K 


272  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

years;  but  knowledge  of  her  scholarship  was  lacking.  On  the 
other  hand  her  wide  awake  and  mischievous  air,  and  the  vivacity  of 
her  speech  made  a  favorable  impression  upon  us.  We  made  the 
test  of  intelligence  and  that  showed  us  that  her  intelligence  was 
normal;  she  was  backward  scarcely  a  year.  This  is  a  character- 
istic example  which  shows  the  use  of  our  measuring  scale. 

In  terminating  this  account,  it  will  suffice  to  make  a  very  brief 
allusion  to  the  appreciation  of  penal  responsibility;  there  also  our 
scale  will  render  service.  The  problems  of  penal  responsibility 
such  as  are  actually  placed  before  the  tribunals,  are  most  com- 
plex and  recently  have  caused  discussions  that  are  highly  curious 
on  account  of  the  attention  which  has  been  paid  to  words  rather 
than  to  things.  We  have  scarcely  the  space  here  to  make  the 
multiple  distinctions  which  would  be  necessary  in  making  clear 
the  real  situation.  It  will  suffice  to  remark  that  in  certain  cases 
experts  have  to  give  their  opinion  on  the  degree  of  intelligence  of 
an  accused  person;  and  that  according  to  their  customary  point 
of  view  which  consists  in  distinguishing  health  from  illness  they 
are  preoccupied  in  learning  if  the  accused  should  or  should  not 
enter  the  group  of  feeble-minded.  It  is  strange  that  so  far,  no 
other  criterion  than  a  subjective  impression  can  guide  them;  they 
weigh  each  case  with  their  good  sense,  which  presupposes  in  the 
first  place  that  this  is  a  possession  common  to  all  men,  and  in  the 
second  place  that  everybody's  good  sense  is  equal  to  every  other 
person's. 

We  suggest  to  them  that  they  should  use  the  six  differentiating 
tests  that  we  have  described  above.  By  the  methodical  employ- 
ment of  these  tests,  they  will  arrive  at  precise  and  controllable 
conclusions,  which  at  the  same  time  cannot  help  but  enhance 
in  the  mind  of  the  judges  the  value  of  the  medico-legal  appraise- 
ment of  the  ahenists. 

These  examples  to  which  we  could  add  many  others^^  show  that 

*'  Let  us  point  out  the  very  great  utility  to  humanity  that  would  result 
from  giving  the  intellectual  test  to  young  recruits  before  enlisting  them. 
Many  morons,  that  is  to  say,  young  men  who  on  account  of  their  weak  minds 
are  unable  to  learn  and  understand  the  theory  and  drill  of  arms  and  to  sub- 
mit to  a  regular  discipline,  come  to  the  medical  examination,  and  are  pro- 
nounced "good  for  the  military  service,"  because  one  does  not  know  how  to 
examine  them  from  the  intellectual  point  of  view.  We  have  learned  that 
in  Germany  they  pay  attention  to  the  mental  debility  of  the  recruits  who 
are  measured  before  enlistment  by  means  of  examination  questions,  writ- 


THE   USE   OF   THE   SCALE  273 

the  methods  of  measuring  the  individual  intelligence  have  not  a 
speculative  interest  alone;  by  the  direction,  by  the  organization 
of  all  the  investigations,  psychology  has  furnished  the  proof  (we 
do  not  say  for  the  first  time  but  in  a  more  positive  manner  than 
ever  before),  that  it  is  in  a  fair  way  to  become  a  science  of  great 
social  utility. 

Alfred  Binet  and  Th.  Simon. 

tenijjy  Dr.  Schultze,  professor  of  psychiatry,  on  the  Faculty  of  Medicine 
at  Greifswald.  These  examination  questions  are  made  so  that  a  twelve 
year  old  child  of  average  intelligence  and  without  any  training  can  answer 
them.  One  of  us  referred  these  questions  to  the  Minister  of  War,  who 
answered  that  he  would  ask  for  a  report  on  the  matter.  We  have  reason  to 
believe  that  this  answer  is  not  the  polite  refusal  which  is  customary  with 
the  State  Administration,  when  they  are  importuned  with  propositions 
from  the  outside.  And  we  shall  most  probably  soon  have  the  pleasure  of 
telling  the  readers  of  UAnnee  the  result  of  our  experiments  on  defectiveness 
among  the  recruits,  and  the  means  of  detecting  it  and  avoiding  the 
simulation. 


NEW  INVESTIGATION  UPON  THE  MEASURE  OF  THE 

INTELLECTUAL  LEVEL  AMONG  SCHOOL 

CHILDREN 

UAnnee  Fsychologique,  191  Ij  1J^5-201 

The  method  which  we  worked  out  with  Dr.  Simon  for  the 
measuring  of  the  intellectual  level  of  children  has  not  passed 
unnoticed;  it  has  received  eulogies  and  has  raised  criticisms;^  we 
have  thought  it  worth  while  to  revise  and  perfect  it;  many  devoted 
collaborators,  among  whom  we  are  happy  to  cite  MM.  Bichon, 
Levistre,  Morl^,  and  Vaney,  school  directors  at  Paris,  Mile. 
Giroud,  M.  Jeanjean,  students  at  our  laboratory,  and  numerous 
other  persons,  have  collected  new  facts  which  have  permitted  us 
to  bring  important  modifications  to  oiu-  first  plan.  The  points 
which  we  shall  specially  study  are  the  following: 

1.  What  modifications  ought  to  be  introduced  into  the  series 
of  tests? 

2.  What  are  the  existing  relations  between  the  intellectual  level 
and  the  scholastic  level? 

3.  What  modifications  are  presented  by  testing  the  intellectual 
level  of  a  given  child  at  intervals  of  fifteen  days? 

*  Besides  the  references  that  we  shall  cite  in  the  text,  we  would  especially 
mention  among  the  authors  who  have  discussed,  practiced,  or  criticized 
this  method :  H.  H.  Goddard,  The  Binet-Simon  Tests  of  Intellectual  Capac- 
ity, in  the  Training  School,  December  5,  1908  (the  author  has  applied  the 
method  to  a  large  number  of  subnormal  children) ;  Guy  Montrose  Whipple, 
Manual  of  Mental  and  Physical  Tests,  Baltimore,  1910;  at  the  end  of  the 
book  our  method  is  set  forth  at  length,  with  a  reproduction  of  our  pictures. 
Whipple  has  transformed  certain  ones  of  our  tests  in  order  to  make  them 
adaptable  to  English  children;  for  example,  the  tests  with  the  money  have 
received  the  necessary  modifications.  But  what  is  curious  is  that  the  au- 
thor has  believed  it  useful  to  substitute  for  our  sentences  to  be  criticised, 
new  sentences,  under  the  pretext  that  our  sentences  are  too  gruesome. 
We  refer  particularly  to  the  woman  cut  into  pieces,  of  an  accident  on  the 
train  which  produced  48  deaths,  and  the  man  who  committed  suicide;  it 
appears  that  these  stories  seem  frightful  to  the  American  youth.  Our 
Parisian  youths  laugh  at  them.  However  that  may  be,  we  believe  that  the 
new  sentences  of  Whipple's  should  not  be  accepted  without  being  tried  out 
experimentally.  No  other  tests  will  present  the  same  difficulty  of  compre- 
hension as  ours. 

274 


LAST   REVISION 1911  276 

4.  How  can  teachers,  by  their  own  means,  estimate  the  intelli- 
gence of  a  child? 

5.  What  differences  exist  in  the  intelligence  of  children  belong- 
ing to  different  social  conditions? 

6.  What  are  the  differences  between  our  method  and  the 
methods  with  tests  not  arranged  in  a  hierarchy? 

7.  Review  of  several  recent  works  which  have  criticized  our 
method. 

Proposed  Corrections  to  the  Measuring  Scale  of 
Intelligence 

Some  objections  to  our  scale  have  been  made  which  seem  to  us 
just ;  we  ourselves,  in  employing  it,  have  discovered  its  defects  and 
have  sought  to  repair  them.  Here  are  the  points  which  demand 
improvement. 

1.  Certain  tests  have  been  repeated.  For  example  at  five  years, 
there  is  a  test  of  repetition  of  ten  syllables  and  at  six  years  one  of 
sixteen  syllables.  We  suppress  the  second  repetition  because  it 
too  closely  resembles  the  first. 

2.  There  are  tests  which  require  a  knowledge  outside  the  intel- 
ligence of  the  child.  To  know  his  age,  count  his  fingers,  recite 
the  days  of  the  week  indicate  that  he  has  learned  these  little  facts 
from  his  parents  or  friends;  we  have  thought  well  bo  suppress  these 
three  tests. 

3.  There  are  tests  too  exclusively  scholastic,  as  that  of  reading 
and  retaining  a  given  number  of  memories  of  what  has  been  read, 
or  copying  a  written  model,  or  writing  from  dictation.  We  sup- 
press these,  believing  that  the  tests  of  instruction  devised  by  M. 
Vaney,  will  suffice  to  establish  the  scholastic  knowledge  of  a 
child.     We  advise  recourse  to  his  method  when  the  need  is  felt. 

4.  It  results  from  the  preceding  investigations  that  the  tests  for 
twelve  years  are  too  difficult,  also  those  for  eleven  years.  We 
have  therefore  carried  over  to  twelve  years  the  tests  first  classed 
under  eleven  years. 

5.  Lastly,  to  fill  the  blanks  produced  by  our  suppressions,  we 
have  devised  some  new  tests  and  have  tried  them  upon  new 
subjects. 

In  taking  count  of  all  these  modifications  we  have  obtained  the 
following  series  (the  tests  under  six  years  have  undergone  no 


276 


DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 


change.  We  have  not  considered  it  worth  while  to  reproduce 
them.  They  will  be  found  in  UAnnee  Psychologique,  1908,  p. 
69)  .2  • 


Six  years 

Distinguish  morning   and   evening 

(p.  206). 
Define  by  use  (p.  204). 
Copy  diamond  (p.  209). 
Count  13  pennies  (p.  210). 
Compare  2  pictures  esthetically  (p. 

202). 

Seven  years 

Right  hand,  left  ear  (p.  201). 
Describe  a  picture  (p.  210). 
Execute  3  commissions  (p.  205). 
Count  3  single  and  3  double  sous  (p. 

214). 
Name  4  colors  (p.  215). 


Eight  years 
2  objects  from  memory 


Compare 

(p.  216). 
Count  from  20  to  0  (p.  215). 
Indicate  omission   in  pictures    (p. 

207). 
Give  the  date  (p.  217). 
Repeat  5  digits  (p.  210). 

Nine  years 

Give  change  out  of  20  sous  (p.  218). 
Definitions  superior  to  use  (p.  205). 
Recognize  the  value  of  9  pieces  of 

money  (p.  221). 
Name  the  months  (p.  221). 
Comprehend  easy  questions  (p.  224). 

Ten  years 
Place  5  weights  in  order  (p.  220). 

We  have  satisfied  ourselves  that  the  appHcation  of  these  new 
tests  produces  no  important  change  in  the  results;  and  on  the  other 
hand,  as  the  number  of  tests  has  been  lessened,  the  examination 

238,  in  this  volume. 


Copy   a   design  from   memory    (p. 

60,  282). 
Criticize  absurd  statements  (p.  227). 
Comprehend  difficult  questions  (p. 

225). 
Place  3  words  in  2  sentences  (p.  222). 

Twelve  years 

Resist  the  suggestion  of  lines  (p. 
284). 

Place  3  words  in  1  sentence  (p.  229). 

Give  more  than  60  words  in  3  min- 
utes (p.  229). 

Define  3  abstract  words  (p.  230). 

Comprehend  a  disarranged  sentence 
(p.  231). 

Fifteen  years 

Repeat  7  figures  (p.  232). 

Find  3  rhymes  (p.  232). 

Repeat  a  sentence  of  26  syllables 
(p.  232). 

Interpret  a  picture  (p.  193). 

Solve  a  problem  composed  of  sev- 
eral facts  (p.  233). 

Adults 

Comprehedd  a  cut  in  a  folded  paper 
(p.  234). 

Reversed  triangle  (p.  235). 

Answer  the  question  about  the  Pres- 
ident (p.  287). 

Distinguish  abstract  words  (p.  286). 

Give  the  sense  of  the  quotation  from 
Hervieu  (p.  287). 


s 


LAST  KEVISION — 1911 


277 


gains  in  rapidity  which  is  an  advantage.  In  employing  our 
modified  plan,  MM.  Levistre  and  Morle,  school  directors,  meas- 
ured the  intelligence  of  many  school  children  j  we  indicate  in  Table 
I  the  distribution  of  the  pupils  according  to  these  investigations, 
how  many  are  of  average  intelligence,  how  many  superior,  and 
how  many  inferior  to  the  average.^  Other  trained  persons  have 
been  willing  to  experiment  for  us;  we  have  utilized  them;  but  for 
reasons  which  are  too  long  and  uninteresting  to  explain  here,  we 
do  not  describe  their  results  at  present. 

Table  I 

Table  showing  the  number  of  intellectually  regular,  advanced,  or  retarded 
children,  for  the  different  school  ages 

12 

TEARS 


Regular 

Advanced  1  year 

Advanced  2  years 

Advanced  3  years  and  more 

Retarded  1  year 

Retarded  2  years 

Retarded  3  years  and  more. 


7 

8 

9 

10 

TEARS 

TEARS 

TEARS 

TEARS 

5 

9 

17 

9 

1 

4 

6 

1 

1 

1 

4 

3 

6 

1 

7 

1 

It  will  be  seen  that  there  are  children  who  are  advanced 
or  retarded  in  intelligence  by  more  than  two  years.  In  our 
first  study  we  did  not  encounter  any  such;  the  reason  is  easy  to 
understand;  because  in  our  first  study  we  operated  only  upon 
children  chosen  among  those  who  were  regular  in  their  studies. 
We  thus  limited  our  field  of  experiment  because  we  were  in  haste 
to  secure  a  knowledge  of  average  children  and  the  individual  devi- 
ations did  not  then  interest  us.  Sufficient  unto  the  day  is  the 
task  thereof.  Since  then  we  have  thought  best  not  to  select  our 
pupils,  but  take  them  as  they  come.  MM.  Levistre  and  Morl^ 
made  a  special  point  of  choosing  only  such  pupils  as  were  within 
at  least  two  months  of  their  birthday  at  the  time  of  the  examina- 
tion; and  it  is  within  this  contingent  that  they  found  the  scholas- 

^  In  the  table,  the  figures  are  not  percentages,  but  indicate  the  number 
of  children  for  each  test.  Thus,  for  the  age  of  seven  years,  there  were  only 
ten  children  studied;  for  the  age  of  eight  years, ''there  were  twenty,  etc. 
The  schools  of  MM.  Morle  and  Levistre  are  situated  in  the  poor  quarters 
of  Paris,  rue  des  Recollets  and  rue  de  Sambre-et-Meuse,  in  the  XII  ward. 
Experience  has  shown 'US  that  these  are  important  circumstances  to  note. 


278  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

tically  retarded  and  advanced;  as  a  result  of  this  we  find  that  in- 
dividual deviations  have  become  greater.  Another  director, 
whose  school  is  situated  in  the  richest  quarter  of  Paris,  measured 
the  intellectual  level  of  seven  or  eight  children;  he  found  those 
who  were  four,  and  even  five  years  in  advance.  It  must  not  there- 
fore be  considered  as  an  anomaly  to  find  an  advance  or  a  retarda- 
tion of  three  years. 

It  will  further  be  noticed  that  in  our  new  scale  there  are  exactly 
five  tests  for  each  age.  We  have  thus  introduced  more  regularity 
into  our  tests.  The  preceding  scale  published  in  1908  contained 
sometimes  five,  sometimes  six,  sometimes  seven.  The  modifica- 
tions which  we  have  adopted  present,  among  other  advantages, 
that  of  permitting  a  more  rapid  application  and  one  arriving 
nearer  the  intellectual  level.  Here  is  the  rule  to  follow:  take  for 
point  of  departure,  the  age  at  which  all  the  tests  are  passed;  and 
beyond  this  age,  count  as  many  fifths  of  a  year  as  there  are  tests 
passed.  Example:  a  child  of  eight  years  passes  all  the  tests  of  six 
years,  2  of  seven  years,  3  of  eight  years,  2  of  nine  years,  1  of  ten 
years;  he  has  therefore  the  level  of  six  years  plus  the  benefit  of 
eight  tests  or  eight-fifths  years,  or  a  year  and  three-fifths,  equaling 
a  level  of  seven  years  and  three-fifths,  or  more  simply  7.6.  This 
calculation  permits  the  appreciation  of  the  intellectual  level  by 
means  of  a  fraction.  But  it  must  be  well  understood  that  this 
fraction  is  so  delicate  an  appreciation,  that  it  does  not  merit  abso- 
lute confidence,  because  it  varies  appreciably  from  one  examina- 
tion to  another. 

It  has  seemed  to  me  worth  while  to  publish,  at  least  once,  the 
figures  expressing  how  many  times  a  given  test  has  been  passed 
and  how  many  times  missed  by  pupils  of  the  different  ages.  I 
have  therefore  made  a  calculation,  based  upon  a  great  number  of 
experiments  old  and  new,  which  is  given  in  Table  II  having,  I 
hasten  to  say,  especially  an  empirical  value.  It  is  interesting  to 
consult  because  it  shows  the  number  of  children  upon  whom  we 
have  operated;  but  like  all  gross  results,  it  needs  to  be  liberally 
interpreted,  and  perhaps  even  rectified,  because  the  gross  result 
may  lead  to  error.  Note,  in  effect,  what  course  we  followed  in 
our  experiments.  We  felt  the  need  of  economizing  effort  in  the 
investigation.  It  requires  indeed,  a  great  deal  of  courage  to  con- 
tinue through  long  afternoons,  a  work,  from  which  very  shght 
conclusions  can  be  drawn  relative  to  the  effort  put  forth.     This 


LAST  REVISION — 1911 


279 


Table  II 

Empirical  table  of  the  results  obtained  in  the  experiments  relative  to  the  intel- 
lectual level  of  Primary  School  children  of  Paris,  belonging  to  a  mediocre 
social  level.  The  figures  of  the  table  indicate  the  number  of  children  who  for 
each  test  have  furnished  positive,  negative,  or  doubtful  results.  Example: 
For  the  problem  of  several  facts,  which  is  a  test  of  15  years,  2  children  of  10 
replied  correctly  and  19  failed.  These  crude  results  need  to  be  interpreted: 
see  text. 


DIFFERENT   TE8T3 


AGE  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

7  years 

8  years 

9  years 

10  years 

12  years 

+ 

- 

? 

+ 

- 

? 

+ 

- 

? 

+ 

- 

? 

+ 

- 

? 

12 

4 

13 

6 

24 

2 

20 

6 

16 

3 

10 

10 

7 

2 

22 

7 

10 

0 

15 

15 

5 

5 

23 

7 

13 

2 

23 

5 

9 

1 

17 

7 

37 

6 

18 

0 

15 

10 

38 

4 

1 

19 

1 

12 

13 

36 

7 

27 

2 

18 

6 

1 

34 

9 

17 

1 

1 

20 

0 

13 

5 

35 

0 

17 

0 

10 

10 

18 

21 

1 

37 

12 

23 

12 

3 

16 

17 

23 

46 

4 

29 

10 

5 

11 

11 

29 

27 

38 
40 

24 

11 

6 

22 

44 
41 

20 

3 
6 

24 
23 

2 
3 

12 

33 

5 

20 

25 

2 

21 

5 

40 

9 

1 

41 

6 

30 

0 

10 

37 

3 

14 

32 

2 

22 

7 

^ 

Six  years 

Right  hand,  left  ear 

Compare  2  faces 

Define  by  use 

Execute  3  commissions 

Distinguish  morning  and  evening. 

Seven  years 

Indicate  omission  in  picture 

Copy  a  diamond 

Repeat  5  digits 

Describe  a  picture 

Count  13  single  sous 

Eight  years 
Count  3  single  and  3  double  sous . . 

Name  4  colors 

Count  from  20  to  0 

Compare  2  objects  from  memory... 
Suggestion  of  lines 

Nine  years 

Give  the  date 

Define  better  than  by  use 

Give  change  from  20  sous 

Place  5  weights  in  order 

Copy  a  design  from    memory 

Ten  years 

Name  the  months 

9  pieces  of  money 

Put  3  words  into  2  sentences 

Comprehend  3  easy  questions 

Comprehend  5  difficult  questions.., 


280 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 
Table  II — Continued 


DIFFERENT  TESTS 


Twelve  years 

Criticize  sentences 

Put  3  words  into  one  sentence 

60  words  in  3  minutes 

Abstract  definitions 

Words  to  be  put  in  order 

Fifteen  years 

Repeat  7  digits 

Rhymes 

Repeat  26  syllables 

Interpret  pictures 

Problem  of  several  facts 


AGE   OF   THE  CHILDREN 


7  years 


8  years 


+  -  ? 


9  years 


10  years 


12  years 


explains  why,  after  finding  the  level  of  his  intelligence,  we  have 
not  put  the  entire  series  to  each'  child.  Being  given  a  child  of 
eight,  for  example,  we  have  given  the  tests  of  eight,  nine  and  ten 
years;  and  we  have  used  the  tests  of  seven  and  six  years  only  when 
the  child  has  failed  on  the  succeeding  years.  As  a  whole  we  have 
economized  our  work,  doing  only  what  was  necessary  to  establish 
the  intellectual  level  of  each  child,  and  not  concerning  ourselves 
deeply  with  the  manner  in  which  each  test  is  comprehended  by 
children  of  all  ages.  A  double  consequence  results  from  this, 
which  makes  itself  plainly  felt  now  that  we  attempt  the  tabula- 
tion of  our  results.  In  order  to  explain,  let  us  continue  the  ex- 
ample of  children  of  eight  years.  Here  where  we  have  30  or  more 
who  have  been  given  the  tests  of  eight  years,  there  are  only  10  or 
15  of  them  who  have  been  given  those  of  seven  years;  in  the  same 
way  there  are  only  5  or  6  who  were  given  those  of  ten  years.  How 
are  we  therefore  going  to  represent  these  results?  Out  of  the  42 
to  whom  a  certain  test  of  eight  years  has  been  given,  for  example 
naming  the  colors,  there  are  38  who  named  them  exactly  and  4 
who  miscalled  at  least  one.  We  take  these  two  numbers,  the  rela- 
tion between  which  is  especially  interesting,  and  place  them  in 
our  table.     But  for  the  tests  of  seven  years  which  were  given  to 


LAST  REVISION 1911  281 

fewer  subjects  than  those  of  eight  years,  can  we  proceed  in  the 
same  way?  Only  10  were  asked  to  repeat  a  series  of  five  digits; 
5  succeeded  and  5  failed.  Is  it  correct  to  record  this  number  with- 
out comment  and  consider  them  as  of  the  same  value  as  38  and  4? 
Evidently  not;  because  if  that  test  had  been  given  to  only  10 
children  taken  from  the  group  of  42  pupils  of  eight  years,  one 
would  conclude,  a  priori,  from  the  table  of  results,  that  it  was  only 
those  10  pupils  whose  results  were  doubtful,  and  one  would  pre- 
sume in  advance  that  for  the  32  others,  good  replies  were  certain. 
We  must  therefore  say  that  5  pupils  failed,  not  out  of  10,  but  out 
of  the  contingent  of  42,  which  completely  changes  the  proportion. 
An  analogous  reasoning  can  be  made  relative  to  the  tests  of  ten 
and  twelve  years  which  were  given  to  some  children  of  eight  years; 
all  those  to  whom  the  test  was  not  given  might  be  considered  as 
unable  to  pass  it,  because  if  it  was  not  attempted  in  their  case,  it 
is  clear  that  the  poor  results  obtained  from  the  earlier  tests  per- 
mitted no  chance  of  securing  better  results  from  the  more  difiicult 
ones;  thus  again  in  the  case  where  5  subjects  succeed  in  a  certain 
test  of  ten  years,  and  5  fail,  it  will  not  do  to  count  5  successes 
among  10  subjects,  nor  5  successes  against  5  failures  but  rather  5 
successes  against  42  failures. 

I  do  not  disguise  the  fact  that  there  is  something  arbitrary  in 
this  manner  of  presenting  the  figures;  but  I  beheve  that  the  ab- 
sence of  interpretation  is  far  more  dangerous.  In  any  case  after 
having  calculated  this  table  from  the  empirical  results,  I  thought 
necessary  to  calculate  another  where  the  figures  are  interpreted 
in  the  way  I  have  just  indicated;  that  is  to  say  in  calculating  the 
good  and  the  bad  replies  according  to  the  rule  of  probability, 
whose  justice  I  have  attempted  to  make  apparent.  It  is  to  Table 
III  that  one  must  refer  in  order  to  judge  of  the  value  of  the  tests. 

This  Table  III  was  constructed  from  experiments  tried  upon  an 
average  of  20  children  for  each  age;  I  owe  these  experiments, 
which  have  been  made  in  the  most  attentive  and  serious  manner, 
to  M.  Levistre  and  to  M.  Morle.  These  two  directors  have  their 
schools  situated  in  the  tenth  ward  of  Paris;  the  population  which 
frequents  these  schools  is  of  average  social  standing.  In  order 
to  appreciate  the  value  of  our  figures  it  will  be  understood  that 
these  indications  are  very  important;  because  the  intellectual 
level  of  the  children  is  modified  according  to  the  wealth  of  the 
population. 


282 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 


Finally  it  will  be  seen,  that  the  new  order  of  tests  which  we 
propose  is  justified  by  the  figures  of  the  table;  we  have  arranged 
the  tests  according  to  their  difficulty,  so  that  the  easier  ones  are 
placed  before  the  more  difficult  .  The  degree  of  difficulty  is  indi- 
cated by  the  figures.  These  figures  are  always  reckoned  in  their 
relation  to  10.  Thus  8  signifies  that  8  children  out  of  10  have 
passed  the  test. 

It  sometimes  happens,  that  for  a  given  test,  certain  astonishing 
irregularities  occur.  It  is  passed  by  the  10  children  of  nine  years, 
that  is  to  say  by  all,  and  only  by  9  children  of  ten  years;  this  is 
altogether  inexplicable  in  theory,  because  it  is  certain  that  chil- 
dren of  ten  years  in  general  are  more  intelligent  than  those  a 
year  younger;  without  doubt  there  slipped  into  the  group  of  ten 
years  several  children  with  but  little  intelligence  or  those  who  were 
distracted,  which  produced  this  failure.  One  can  here  appre- 
ciate the  difference  between  a  theoretical  and  an  experimental 


■Em- 


DESIGN  TO  BE  DRAWN  FROM  MEMORY  AFTER  BEING  STUDIED  10  SECONDS 

curve;  the  latter  almost  always  presents  slight  imperfections. 
These  must  not  be  ignored;  they  are  proofs  of  the  sincerity  of  the 
experiments;  when  an  experimental  curve  is  of  a  too  regular 
beauty,  it  is  often  proof  that  it  has  been  tampered  with. 

Our  Table  III  should  be  kept,  to  judge  of  the  results  which 
other  observers  will  hereafter  obtain;  it  is  a  norm.  If  other  re- 
sults are  obtained  in  quarters  widely  different  from  ours,  the 
reasons  must  be  sought  for,  either  in  the  incapacity  of  the  experi- 
menter, or  perhaps  in  the  differences  of  social  conditions;  we  shall 
return  soon  to  these  differences  of  social  conditions,  and  we  shall 
show  their  importance. 

Some  additional  explanations  are  necessary  for  the  new  tests 
which  we  propose. 

Copy  a  design  from  memory  (test  of  ten  years).  We  show  dur- 
ing ten  seconds  a  card  upon  which  are  drawn  the  designs  here 
given  and  we  ask  the  subject  to  reproduce  them  from  memory. 


LAST   REVISION — 1911 


283 


Table  III 

Table-type  of  the  results  obtained  in  experiments  upon  the  measure  of  the  in- 
tellectual  level,  among  children  of  the  primary  schools  belonging  to  the  aver- 
age sections  of  Paris.  The  figures  of  the  table  are  the  proportion  of  successes 
obtained  with  10  as  a  standard;  for  example,  the  figure  5  signifies  that  5  out 
of  10,  that  is  one-half,  have  passed  the  test. 


DIFFBBBNT  TESTS 


SCHOOLS  OS"  M.  L.  AND  OP  M.  M.  SITU- 
ATED IN  PABIS  RUE  DES  R^COLLETS 
AND   RUE   SAMBRE-ET-MEUSE 


7  years    8  years    9  years  10  years  12  years 


Six  years 
Distinguish  evening  and  morning 

Define  by  use 

Copy  a  diamond 

Count  13  single  sous 

Compare  2  faces 

Seven  years 

Right  hand,  left  ear 

Describe  a  picture 

Execute  3  commissions 

Count  3  single  and  3  double  sous. 
Name  4  colors 

Eight  years 
Compare  2  objects  from  memory. 

Count  from  20  to  0 

Indicate  lack  in  pictures 

Give  the  date 

Repeat  5  digits 

Nine  years 

Give  the  change  from  20  sous 

Define  better  than  by  use 

Pieces  of  money 

Months 

Comprehend  easy  questions 

Ten  years 

Arrange  weights 

Copy  design  from  memory 

Criticize  absurd  questions 

Place  3  words  in  2  sentences 

Comprehend  difficult  questions... 

Twelve  years 

Suggestion  of  lines 

3  words  in  1  sentence 

60  words  in  3  minutes 

Abstract  definitions , 

Disarranged  sentences 


10 

10 

9 

9 

9 

8 

7 
7 
4 
4 

4 
3 
3 
4 
2 


10 
10 
10 
10 
10 

10 

10 

10 

9 

9 

8 
9 
8 
8 
5 

4 
3 
2 
2 
2 

1 
2 


10 
10 

10 
10 

10 


10 

6 

10 


10 
9 

10 


9 
7 
9 
10 
9 

6 
5 
5 
5 
3 

3 
4 
4 
2 
4 


10 
7 
9 
9 

10 


284  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

Before  showing  them,  one  prepares  the  attention  of  the  subject 
by  saying  that  the  drawings  are  going  to  be  shown,  and  that  they 
must  be  reproduced  from  memory,  and  that  the  exposure  before 
his  eyes  will  last  only  ten  seconds,  which  is  very  little.  It  is  quite 
difficult  to  appreciate  the  exactitude  of  the  reproduction,  without 
taking  a  host  of  measurements  which  are  here  unnecessary.  We 
have  adopted  the  following  rule  whose  practice  is  easy; the  test  is 
counted  passed  when  one  design  is  exactly,  and  the  other  design 
is  half  reproduced.  The  section  of  the  prism  is  always  repre- 
sented to  the  left,  as  it  is  the  one  upon  which  the  pupil  ordinarily 
.first  fixes  his  attention,  and  without  doubt  this  is  the  reason  why 
this  figure  is  better  reproduced  than  the  Greek  design.* 

Suggestion  of  lines.  This  test  belongs  to  twelve  years.  A 
booklet  containing  six  white  pages  is  first  prepared.  On  the  first 
page  are  traced  in  ink  two  hues,  a  and  b,  of  which  the  first,  the 
one  to  the  left,  measures  4  cm.,  and  the  second  5;  they  are  on  the 
same  level  separated  by  an  interval  of  1  cm. ;  on  the  second  page, 
two  lines  are  similarly  placed;  but  the  first  on  the  left  measures 

5  cm.,  that  to  the  right  6;  on  the  third  page  the  line  to  the  left  is 

6  cm.,  that  to  the  right  7.  On  each  of  the  three  pages  which 
follow,  there  are  two  lines  placed  in  the  same  way  only  they  are 
equal,  each  measuring  7  cm.  If  we  designate  the  lines  by  the 
letters  of  the  alphabet,  we  have  then  the  following  order: 

a  >  b  g  =  h 

c  >  d  i   =  j 

e  >  f  k  =  1 

In  showing  the  first  three  pairs  of  fines,  the  experimenter  simply 
says  to  the  child,  "Which  is  the  longer  of  these  lines?"  When  he 
reaches  the  last  three  pairs,  he  changes  slightly  the  form  of  the 
interrogation  and  simply  says  "And  here?"  We  consider  the  child 
as  having  passed  when  at  least  twice  out  of  the  three  times  he 
has  seen  that  the  lines  are  equal.  Experience  proves  that  very 
young  children,  even  children  of  seven  years  are  capable  of  dis- 
tinguishing the  difference  between  the  lines  a  and  b,  c  and  d,  e 
and  f .  When  he  comes  to  the  equal  lines,  the  child  finds  himself 
the  object  of  two  influences;  he  has  first  the  influence  of  sugges- 
tion; thus  far,  for  three  times,  he  has  seen  that  the  line  on  the 

^  In  spite  of  this  statement,  the  design  is  printed  in  VAnnee  Psycholo- 
gique  as  we  here  reproduce  it.     Possibly  a  printer's  error.— Editor. 


LAST  REVISION — 1911  285 

right  is  the  longer;  he  is  therefore  led  to  suppose  that  this  will 
continue;  it  is  a  supposition,  a  generaUzation,  in  case  we  should 
admit  the  operation  to  be  conscious  and  due  to  reflection;  but  we 
think  that  more  often  there  is  no  conscious  operation,  but  a  blind 
tendency,  a  natural  automatism,  a  habit  or  rather  the  first  outline 
of  a  habit;  and  though  it  certainly  is  not  strong,  yet  the  tendency 
exists,  audit  may  be  the  determining  factor  in  the  replies,  if  no  con- 
flicting cause  interferes  with  its  action.  The  second  influence  is 
precisely  the  reflection  occasioned  by  the  perception  of  the  lines.  A 
single  glance  sufiices  to  show  that  the  line  at  the  right  ceases  to  be 
longer  thantheoneat  the  left.  If  the  child  realizes  this,  he  will 
resist  the  automatism  and  cease  saying  that  the  line  at  the  right  is 
longer,  and  will  reply  on  the  contrary,  that  they  are  equal.  Thus 
theoretically  analyzed,  this  test  seems  to  reveal  the  suggestibility 
of  a  child;  the  most  suggestible  is  the  one  who  is  guided  by  auto- 
matism for  the  last  three  pairs  of  Hues;  the  least  suggestible  is 
the  one  who  declares  them  equal;  finally  we  admit,  according  to 
the  rule  which  we  have  thus  far  applied,  for  passing  the  test  it 
suffices  to  have  two  correct  replies  out  of  three. 

As  the  term  suggestibility  has  more  than  one  sense,  it  is  impor- 
tant to  remark  that  here  is  a  question  of  suggestibility  not  through 
lack  in  the  quality  of  judgment  but  from  heedlessness,  lack  of 
attention.  The  child  falls  into  the  trap  because  he  allows  him- 
self to  follow  the  lead  of  habit,  and  does  not  pay  attention  to  the 
real  length  of  the  new  lines  which  are  presented  to  him.  But  I  am 
not  sure  that  the  analysis  of  this  particular  form  of  suggestibility  is 
exactly  correct.  Rarely  does  suggestibility  depend  wholly  upon 
the  intelligence;  character  and  feeling  add  their  influence.  There 
are  children  who,  having  successively  replied  under  the  eye  of  the 
master  that  the  longer  line  is  to  the  right,  are,  as  it  were,  incited 
emotionally  to  persist  in  this  designation  to  the  right;  they  be- 
lieve themselves  forced  to  it;  if  they  perceive  that  they  have  com- 
mitted an  error,  they  are  at  times  ashamed,  blush  and  feel  them- 
selves ill  at  ease;  they  do  not  dare  correct  themselves,  but  continue 
the  error.  There  is  here  a  slight  emotional  trouble  which  is  very 
curious  and  which  we  have  insufficiently  analyzed. 

The  test  is  difficult  enough  for  a  child  of  seven  years  to  suc- 
cumb; from  the  very  careful  studies  of  M.  Morl^,  out  of  10  chil- 
dren of  eight  years,  a  single  one  escaped;  out  of  13  children  of  ten 
years,  5  avoided  the  error. 


286  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

A  final  word  upon  the  experiment.  One  might  think  that  the 
automatism  would  be  especially  great  for  the  pair  g-h,  which  fol- 
lows the  pair  where  a  difference  of  length  really  exists.  It  does  not 
seem  that  this  is  the  case.  In  lumping  the  replies  given  by  all  the 
children,  we  find  an  equal  number  of  erroneous  replies  for  the 
couples  g-h,  i-j,  and  k-1. 

I  at  first  thought  of  a  little  different  disposition  of  the  lines,  in 
order  to  avoid  what  seemed  to  me  a  cause  of  error.  I  said  to  my- 
self it  is  as  easy  to  perceive  a  slight  difference  of  length  between 
two  lines,  as  it  is  difficult  to  judge  if  they  are  of  the  same  length; 
there  might  result  from  this  a  certain  difficulty  for  the  children  to 
pronounce  upon;  I  thought  that  perhaps  it  might  be  better  to 
change  the  nature  of  the  test,  by  reversing  the  inequality  of  th^ 
fines  in  the  following  manner: 

a  <  b  g  >  h 

c  <  d  i  >   j 

e  <  f  k  >    1 

It  will  be  seen,  in  this  new  arrangement  that  the  lines  have  ceased 
to  be  equal,  which  forms  the  innovation ;  g  has  grown  larger  than 
h  by  5  mm.;  same  difference  for  other  pairs.  But  we  found  that 
with  this  modification  the  experiment  became  much  too  easy. 
The  child  who  had  formed  the  habit  of  designating  the  line  to  the 
right,  was  not  able  to  persevere  in  it  when  the  new  pairs  were  pre- 
sented to  him,  because  the  greater  length  of  the  line  to  the  left 
stares  him  in  the  face.  From  the  investigations  of  M.  Morle  all 
the  children  of  seven,  of  eight,  of  nine  and  of  ten  years,  upon 
whom  he  tried  the  test,  succeeded;  it  was  too  easy  for  what  we 
desired  to  do  and  hence  we  rejected  it.  We  have  preserved  the 
first  form,  with  three  pairs  of  equal  lines;  and  we  have  made  a 
twelve  year  test  of  it. 

Abstract  differences  (test  for  adults).  What  is  the  difference 
between  idleness  and  laziness?  Between  event  and  advent?  Be- 
tween evolution  and  revolution?  Such  are  the  questions  asked. 
Two  good  repfies  suffice.  It  is  necessary  in  distinguishing  be- 
tween idleness  and  laziness,  to  clearly  indicate  that  idleness  comes 
from  exterior  circumstances,  while  laziness  comes  from  character. 
For  the  distinction  between  event  and  advent,  it  is  scarcely  neces- 
sary to  recall  that  event  is  a  completed  fact  of  any  kind,  while  the 
advent  is  a  coming.      Evolution  is  a   slow  progressive  change; 


LAST  REVISION — 1911  287 

revolution  is  a  sudden  change;  some  persons  take  the  word  evolu- 
tion in  the  sense  of  the  manoeuvers  of  a  troop,  and  revolution  in 
the  sense  of  a  serious  popular  insurrection;  in  this  case  the  dis- 
tinction is  not  so  good,  because  here  the  two  words  are  different 
without  being  opposite,  and  it  must  be  understood  that  we  are 
here  searching  for  opposites,  and  not  simply  differences.  Never- 
theless, we  admit  that  these  replies  are  passable. 

Reproduction  of  the  thought  of  Hervieu  (test  for  adults) .  Read 
aloud,  slowly  and  with  correct  intonation,  the  following  selection 
which  we  usually  call  the  thought  of  Hervieu;  it  is  only  his  thought 
developed;  he  wrote  three  lines  that  did  not  adapt  themselves  to 
our  needs;  we  have  therefore  amplified  his  thought  to  prevent  its 
being  retained  by  the  memory  alone,  something  which  might  have 
occurred  if  the  selection  were  too  short. 

One  hears  very  different  judgments  on  the  value  of  life.  Some  say  it  is 
good,  others  say  it  is  bad.  It  would  be  more  correct  to  say  that  it  is  medi- 
ocre; because  on  the  one  hand  it  always  brings  us  less  happiness  than  we 
desire,  while  on  the  other  hand  the  misfortunes  it  brings  are  always  less 
than  others  desire  for  us.  It  is  the  mediocrity  of  life  which  makes  it  just; 
or,  rather,  that  keeps  it  from  being  positively  unjust. 

Before  beginning  the  reading,  the  listener  must  be  warned  to 
give  close  attention,  for  he  will  be  asked  when  the  reading  is  fin- 
ished, to  repeat  the  sense  of  the  selection.  In  this  way  the  test 
is  carried  into  the  domain  of  memory,  and  whoever  has  failed  to 
understand  the  somewhat  subtle  sense  of  the  thought  of  Her- 
vieu, will  not  have  the  slightest  wounding  of  his  pride  such  as 
would  occur  if  he  had  to  admit  not  understanding  it;  he  will  blame 
his  memory  or  failure  of  attention,  which  is  infinitely  less  painful. 
The  central  thought,  the  one  necessary  to  reproduce  is  the 
following: 

Life  is  neither  good  nor  bad,  but  mediocre,  because  it  is  inferior  to  what 
we  desire  and  better  than  what  others  desire  for  us. 

It  is  of  slight  importance  what  words  are  used.  The  essential 
is  that  the  thought  be  well  understood;  and  one  will  grasp  this  in 
proportion  as  he  abstains  from  reflecting  upon  it  word  for  word. 

Question  of  president  (test  for  adult).  Question:  there  are 
three  principal  differences  between  a  king  and  the  president  of 
a  republic.  What  are  they?  The  three  differences  are  the  fol- 
lowing: the  power  of  the  king  is  hereditary;  it  lasts  through  the 


288  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

life  of  the  monarch;  and  it  has  extensive  power;  the  president  of  a 
repubhc  is  elected;  he  has  a  limited  term,  and  his  powers  are  less 
extensive  than  those  of  a  king. 

What  are  the  Relations  Between  the  Intellectual  Level 
AND  THE  Scholastic  Standing? 

At  the  time  of  our  first  investigations  in  1908,  we  begged  the 
directors  to  send  us  only  the  children  who  were  regular  in  their 
instruction;  this  time  we  have  taken  all  of  the  children  who  were 
within  two  months  of  their  birthday  and  we  have  designated  the 
children  as  advanced,  regular,  or  retarded  in  their  studies.  The 
group  upon  which  we  have  operated  has  not  therefore  been  a  se- 
lected one.  We  have  measured  the  intelligence  of  about  100  chil- 
dren; out  of  this  number,  there  have  been 

Regular 64 

-.       ,  ,„  /advance  of  1  year    12 

In  advance 12  <,  ._*'  ^ 

[advance  of  2  years    0 

(retarded  1  year  17 
retarded  2  year  3 
retarded  3  year      1 

It  is  therefore  natural  to  search  for  the  deviations  to  be  noted 
between  the  intellectual  level  and  the  scholastic  standing. 

Thus  far  we  have  been  unable  to  study  these  divergences;  we 
have  simply  noted  this  fact,  that  the  scholastic  divergence  is 
greater  than  the  intellectual  divergence,  and  that  for  instance, 
subnormal  children  who  are  sometimes  retarded  in  instruction  six 
or  seven  years,  are  not  equally  retarded  in  intelligence.  But  these 
are  only  partial  views.  Out  of  our  hundred  little  children  who  are 
all  normal,  let  us  see  how  the  intelligence  distributes  itself  accord- 
ing to  the  scholastic  situation.  Let  us  draw  an  average  of  the 
differences  which  can  be  seen  between  the  two  figures  expressing 
the  two  levels;  a  child  for  instance,  retarded  two  years  scholas- 
tically,  has  an  intellectual  retardation  of  one  year;  the  difference 
is  one  year.  What  is  the  average  difference?  It  is  very  low, 
exactly  0.7  years;  in  other  words  half  a  year.  That  is  to  say;  in 
general,  children  have  an  intelligence  in  accord  with  their  degree 
of  instruction.  Thus  the  rule  that  we  have  proposed  for  some 
time  past,  by  which  we  can  quickly  select  the  most  intelligent 
children  of  a  school,  is  confirmed,  take  the  youngest  in  each  class, 


INTELLECTUAL  LEVEL  AND  SCHOOL  STANDING       289 

because  the  youngest  are  the  most  advanced  in  their  studies;  we 
have  just  seen,  that  the  inteUigence  generally  goes  hand  in  hand 
with  the  degree  of  instruction,  hence  the  most  advanced  in  their 
studies  have  the  chance  of  taking  rank  among  the  most 
intelligent. 

This  rule  is  not  absolute;  it  is  an  empirical  rule,  a  result  pro- 
duced by  a  certain  number  of  factors;  and  if  the  factors  are  lack- 
ing the  rule  ceases  to  be  applicable.  One  can,  with  great  prob- 
abihty,  imagine  country  children  who  have  been  kept  at  home 
too  long  herding  the  cows;  when  they  come  to  school  they  are 
very  much  behind,  but  this  backwardness  is  no  sign  of  a  lack  of 
intelligence.  One  of  our  subjects  is  in  this  condition,  a  child  of 
twelve  years,  he  is  therefore  regular  as  to  intelligence.  But  as 
to  instruction,  what  retardation?  He  is  in  the  elementary  class 
second  year.  His  master,  of  whom  we  asked  information  regard- 
ing the  children  measured,  writes  of  young  Dufour:  "IlKterate 
surroundings,  unfavorable  for  intellectual  progress;  the  child  re- 
mained long  in  the  country;  irregular  in  school  because  of  illness. 
Has  been  in  school  the  last  six  months."  This  information, 
although  brief,  clearly  indicates  that  Dufour^s  retardation  in  in- 
struction is  not  the  result  of  intellectual  retardation.  We  have 
since  learned  that  he  is  progressing  rapidly,  and  making  up  for 
lost  time.  This  confirms  our  demonstration  of  the  measure  of  his 
intellectual  level. 

If  the  case  of  Dufour  can  be  explained  by  an  insufficiency  of 
scholastic  training,  other  cases  can  be  explained  by  indolence,  or 
by  other  special  reasons.  With  M.  Levistre,  school  director,  I 
have  made  an  analysis  of  the  circumstances  which  might  explain 
the  difference  of  two  years  between  the  scholastic  level  and  the 
intellectual  level  of  the  children  of  his  school;  this  analysis  was 
made  for  six  pupils,  and  note  the  result.  For  two  children  no 
explanation  has  been  found;  for  one  who  is  regular  scholastically 
but  retarded  intellectually,  the  Director  informed  me  that  that 
child  had  been  placed  in  a  class  in  advance  of  his  powers  in  order 
to  fill  a  vacancy;  consequently  the  figure  showing  his  scholastic 
situation  is  not  correct,  and  should  not  be  taken  into  considera- 
tion; as  to  the  three  others  who  have  more  intelligence  than  instruc- 
tion, they  are  all  indolent.  Thus,  I  believe,  that  a  minute  and 
impartial  examination  of  the  facts  will  generally  result  in  an  ex- 
planation of  the  apparent  anomalies. 


290 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 


However  it  be,  the  comparison  of  the  figures  of  the  intellectual 
and  the  scholastic  levels  gives  rise  to  a  very  interesting  considera- 
tion; it  is,  that  never,  or  almost  never,  does  a  pupil  present  two 
contrary  signs  for  his  intellectual  and  his  scholastic  level.  Thus, 
a  scholar  retarded  one  year,  may  be  retarded  in  intelligence,  or 
he  may  be  regular  in  intelligence;  he  will  never  be  advanced  in 
intelligence;  having  the  sign  +  for  one  level  he  will  not  have  the 
sign  —  for  the  other  level.  A  single  exception  has  presented  it- 
self in  one  hundred  examinations  of  level  ;^  this  is  altogether  insig- 
nificant. That  is  to  say  putting  it  in  less  abstract  terms,  that 
when  a  child  has  a  decidedly  brilhant  intelligence  he  is  never  be- 
hind in  his  studies;  that  when  he  has  an  intelligence  decidedly  be- 
low medium,  he  cannot  be  advanced  in  his  studies.  It  is  equally 
true  that  when  a  child  is  behind  in  his  studies  he  cannot  be  a  bril- 


Tablb  IV 

This  table  shows  the  relation  between  the  intellectual  level  and  the  scholastic 

level 


Intelligence  above  the  average 

Average  intelligence , . 

Intelligence  below  the  average 


CHILDREN  BE- 
HIND IN  SCHOOL 
INSTRUCTION 


1 

9 
14 


CHILDREN 
REGULAR  IN 

SCHOOL 
INSTRUCTION 


16 
33 
16 


CHILDREN 
ADVANCED  IN 

SCHOOL 
INSTRUCTION 


liant  subject;  and  when  he  is  in  advance,  he  cannot  have  a  medi- 
ocre intelligence. 

As  this  assertion  is  not  without  importance,  I  think  it  well  to 
support  it  with  new  combinations  of  figures.  These  will  be  found 
in  Table  IV. 

Thus  one  sees  a  remarkable  correlation  between  the  two  levels; 
and  we  can  express  it  in  the  following  manner:  When  children  are 
backward  in  their  studies,  they  have  one  chance  of  having  an  aver- 
age intelligence  as  against  two  for  having  an  intelligence  inferior 
to  the  average,  and  no  chance  whatever  for  being  brilliant;  if  they 
are  regular  in  their  studies,  they  have  one  chance  of  being  bril- 
hant, one  chance  of  being  dull,  and  two  chances  for  being  of 
medium  intelligence;  if  they  are  in  advance  of  their  studies,  their 

^  Later  investigations  made  on  thirty  children  have  again  shown  the 
justice  of  this  rule,  without  any  exception  whatever. 


INTELLECTUAL  LEVEL  AND  SCHOOL  STANDING       291 

chances  are  nearly  the  same  for  being  brilliant  or  for  being  of  me- 
dium intelligence.  Certainly  this  is  not  a  demonstration  of  paral- 
lelism between  the  faculty  of  intelUgence  and  the  scholastic  fac- 
ulty; one  recognizes  that  the  two  faculties  are  independent;  but 
they  are  not  contradictory;  they  develop  in  the  same  general  way; 
it  is  a  new  proof  of  that  truth,  to  be  held  in  opposition  to  so  many 
paradoxically-minded  persons,  that  the  first  in  school  are  likely  to 
be  the  first  in  life.  Before  leaving  this  point,  I  wish  to  call  atten- 
tion to  a  special  question  which  perhaps  is  of  interest  only  for  pro- 
fessional experimenters.  After  having  proved  how  far  the  scholas- 
tic situation  of  a  child  informs  us  of  his  intelligence,  I  asked 
myself  if  one  could  not  obtain  a  more  exact  determination,  by 
replacing  the  exact  scholastic  situation  by  what  might  be  called 
an  appreciated  scholastic  situation.  Here  is  what  must  be  under- 
stood by  this  term.  In  certain  schools  a  class  may  have  a  very 
low  level;  or  a  pupil  who  belongs  to  a  certain  grade  might,  sup- 
posing he  was  always  one  of  the  first,  be  considered  as  belonging 
to  a  higher  grade;  or  again,  if  he  is  always  one  of  the  last  it  would 
be  just  to  consider  him  as  belonging  to  a  lower  grade.  I  have 
therefore  begged  the  directors  of  the  school  to  rectify  the  school 
grading  of  their  pupils,  by  taking  into  consideration  these  given 
differences.  Later  I  made  some  calculations  to  find  if  the  revised 
school  grading,  when  compared  with  the  figure  denoting  intel- 
lectual level,  presented  less  deviation  than  that  of  the  actual  situ- 
ation; I  was  very  much  astonished  to  find  that  the  deviation  was 
greater  in  the  first  case.  In  a  series  of  45  pupils,  who  have  been 
carefully  studied  from  this  point  of  view,  the  mean  deviation  is 
0.66  between  the  intellectual  level  and  the  scholastic  level  (that 
is  to  say  a  little  more  than  half  a  year)  when  the  school  level  is 
taken  as  it  stands;  and  it  is  about  0.83  (that  is  to  say  a  little  less 
than  a  whole  year)  when  the  school  grading  has  been  corrected. 
The  difference  is  slight,  but  quite  constant.  How  explain  it? 
It  would  seem  that  from  the  moment  that  one  makes  a  serious  and 
penetrating  estimate  of  the  degree  of  instruction  of  a  child,  the 
resulting  figure  should  be  more  significant  than  the  one  which  re- 
sults from  a  grading  which  is  somewhat  arbitrary;  one  might  there- 
fore expect  that  the  scholastic  level  when  revised  would  more 
nearly  approach  that  of  the  intellectual  level.  After  having 
sought  for  an  explanation  of  this  enigma,  I  believe  that  I  have 
foimd  it.     As  a  matter  of  fact  when  a  director  classifies  his  pupils 


292  DEVELOPMENT  OF  INTELLIGENCE 

in  school,  many  things  are  taken  into  consideration  and  among 
them,  a  very  important  one,  is  that  of  the  age  of  the  child.  On 
the  contrary,  when  a  professor  attempts  to  estunate  exactly  the 
amount  of  instruction  of  a  child,  he  does  not  take  the  age  into  con- 
sideration; as  a  result  the  figure  representing  the  estimated  school 
standing  is  farther  removed  from  the  age  of  the  children  than  the 
school  grade.  I  have  noticed  this.  It  is,  however,  very  evident 
that  the  age  is  a  very  important  factor  in  the  formation  of  the  in- 
telUgence;  and  this  is  also  the  reason  why  the  estimated  school 
standing,  taking  less  account  of  age  accords  less  nearly  with  the 
intellectual  level;  end  this  factor  of  age  is  very  important. 

On  THE  Effect  of  Repetition  upon  the  Taking  of  the  Level 

A  Belgian  pedagogue,  who  tried  our  psychological  tests  upon 
the  pupils  of  his  school,  wrote  me  one  day  that  it  would  be  desir- 
able to  have  a  fresh  supply  of  tests,  in  order  to  be  able  to  follow 
from  year  to  year  the  progress  of  a  given  pupil.  This  desire  is 
quite  legitimate.  We  think  that  it  will  be  easy  to  find  such  tests; 
it  will  suffice  to  have  a  little  patience,  and  above  all,  a  little  col- 
laboration. The  method  is  so  simple!  While  waiting  to  have 
this  lack  supplied,  I  thought  well  to  find  out  if  the  same  experi- 
menter, after  a  two  weeks  interval  in  taking  the  level  of  a  certain 
child,  arrived  at  practically  the  same  conclusions.  Upon  this 
point,  I  had  only  vague  conjectures;  I  knew  from  earlier  inves- 
tigations upon  attention  and  adaptation,  that  children  make  quite 
rapid  progress  in  the  experiments,  especially  when  they  are  taken 
individually,  which  removes  the  occasion  of  distraction  and  of 
ennui.  I  could  therefore  suppose  that  if  the  measure  of  the  level 
were  taken  individually,  every  pupil  would  gain  more  or  less  from 
one  sitting  to  another. 

M.  Jeanjean  willingly  devoted  two  afternoons  to  this  question. 
He  knew  the  method  sufficiently  to  practice  it  correctly.  He 
examined  5  children  first  on  the  26th  of  April,  1910;  he  noted  the 
results,  then  sent  the  children  back  to  their  class  without,  of 
course,  telHng  them  his  intentions;  and  he  examined  them  again 
the  10th  of  May  of  the  same  year.  The  examinations  were  made 
in  the  presence  of  M.  Vaney,  director  of  the  school,  rue  Grange- 
aux-Belles,  and  upon  children  of  his  school.  The  five  children 
serving  as  subjects  were  all  about  nine  years  old. 


EFFECT  OF   REPETITION 


293 


There  was  an  appreciable  progress  for  all  at  the  time  of  the 
second  examination,  and  this  progress  naturally  should  be  cred- 
ited to  their  having  become  accustomed  to  the  situation.  We 
mean  a  better  adaptation,  a  better  comprehension  of  what  was 
required;  perhaps  the  pupils  had  talked  together  about  the  ex- 
periment and  had  asked  their  comrades  for  information.  That 
is  not  impossible.  One  among  them,  the  young  AUain,  had  al- 
ready been  examined  by  us  two  years  previously  as  it  turned  out, 
and  he  informed  M.  Jean  jean  that  he  remembered  that  in  the  test 
of  making  change  it  was  necessary  to  give  16  sous  to  be  correct. 

Here  is  the  result.  From  22  to  23  tests  were  given  to  each 
pupil.  Out  of  this  number,  there  was  a  variation  of  two  or  three 
or  even  four  tests,  the  others  remaining  the  same.  In  the  series  of 
figures  which  follow,  we  have  indicated,  under  the  title  *' number 
of  new  failures,"  the  number  of  tests  which  the  subject  had  passed 
the  first  time  and  failed  on  at  the  second  trial;  under  the  title 
"number  of  new  successes,"  we  indicate  the  number  of  tests  not 
passed  at  the  first  trial  that  were  passed  at  the  second. 


NAMES   OF  PUPILS 

NUMBER  OP 

NEW 

FAILURES 

NUMBER  OF 

NEW 
SUCCESSES 

TOTAL  OF  THB 
VARIATIONS 

Allain 

1 

0 

1 

0 
0 

3 
3 

2 
2 
4 

4 

Bouchard 

3 

Danel 

-         3 

Guillemin 

2 

Def  remont 

4 

2 

14 

16 

These  changes  were  made  from  time  to  time,  apparently  by 
chance,  upon  the  following  tests:  months  of  the  year,  arranging 
of  weights,  definitions,  pieces  of  money,  disarranged  sentences, 
placing  3  words  in  one  sentence.  But  the  most  frequent  varia- 
tions centered  upon  two  tests  in  particular;  one  of  these  was  the 
number  of  memories  retained  after  a  reading  of  diverse  fapcts;  its 
variation  was  almost  constant;  it  passed  from  5  to  6,  from  2  to  5, 
and  even  from  7  to  10.  That  is  easily  understood.  These  chil- 
dren read  twice  the  same  selection;  they  should  the  second  time 
remember  more  than  the  first  time.  The  second  of  the  tests  upon 
which  the  most  progress  was  made,  was  the  number  of  words 
spoken  in  3  minutes;  here  improvement  was  the  law;  one  pupil 


294  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

passed  from  54  to  79,  another  from  57  to  87.  I  repeat  that  they 
had  learned  the  way.  Perhaps  they  had  practiced  in  the  interval, 
and  surely  they  had  the  right  since  no  one  forbade  them. 

In  our  new  series  of  tests,  that  of  reading  is  eliminated,  because 
it  belongs  to  the  degree  of  instruction;  but  that  of  finding  words 
still  remains.  On  an  average — if  it  is  possible  to  find  an  average 
from  so  few  experiments — a  child  in  an  interval  of  fifteen  days 
gains  two  tests  or  a  little  more.  According  to  our  new  method  of 
counting,  two  tests  represent  about  five  months  (5  tests  in  reality 
form  one  year).  It  is  a  material  gain.  But  notice  on  the  other 
hand  that  in  repeating  the  tests  two  weeks  apart,  we  have  favored 
the  effects  of  repetition;  if  one  had  waited  a  year,  it  is  very  pos- 
sible that  these  effects  would  have  been  lessened,  and  that  the 
subject  would  have  recalled  almost  nothing  of  what  he  had  done 
at  the  former  trial.  From  all  this  let  us  conclude  that  it  would 
be  useful — but  not  indispensable — to  have  a  new  set  of  tests  for 
successive  trials. 

Here  are  a  few,  which  we  have  eliminated  from  our  new  scale, 
but  which  nevertheless  are  worthy  to  be  retained  under  the  head 
of  a  reserve  supply. 

Tests  of  6  years  {r^.  ^.       .  ,'        .  , 

(^Distinguish  evening  and  morning. 

{The  fingers  of  the  hand. 
Copy  a  written  sentence. 
Name  4  pieces  of  money. 
rj,  r  r.  fRead  and  remember  two  facts. 

\  Write  from  dictation. 

Tests  of  9  years  P^^^  ""^  *^®  '^^®^- 

\Read  and  retain  6  facts. 

Practical  Suggestions  upon  the  Taking  of  the  Level 

We  have  noticed  that  it  is  useful  to  make  certain  recommenda- 
tiong  to  every  experimenter.  Note  first  if  one  is  alone  with  the 
pupil,  or,  if  other  persons  are  present,  who  those  persons  are.  In 
any  case,  impose  absolute  silence  upon  the  witness.  Before  many 
witnesses  a  child  becomes  timid,  which  tends  to  lower  his  level. 
Avoid  this  cause  of  error  as  far  as  possible.  The  presence  of  rela- 
tives is  the  cause  of  still  more  serious  trouble.  It  is  useless  to  add 
that  when  the  witness  or  the  relative  interferes  to  scold  the  child 
or  to  whisper  the  reply  to  him,  a  good  experimenter  has  but  one 
thing  to  do,  either  close  the  experiment  or  dismiss  the  witness. 


PRACTICAL  SUGGESTIONS  295 

The  attitude  to  be  taken  in  regard  to  the  child  is  delicate;  first 
of  all  there  must  be  good  will;  one  must  try  to  remain  in  touch 
with  him;  excite  his  attention,  his  self  respect;  show  satisfaction 
with  all  of  his  replies,  whatever  they  may  be,  encourage  without 
aiding,  without  suggesting;  the  questions  being  of  standardized 
difficulty,  change  nothing.  Avoid  disturbing  the  child  by  fixedly 
regarding  him.  Naturally,  one  will  not  fall  into  the  ridiculous 
error  of  teaching  him;  it  is  a  question  here  of  ascertaining  the  state 
of  his  mentality  not  of  teaching. 

The  tests  should  be  prepared  in  advance;  one  must  have  at  hand 
without  being  obliged  to  search  for  it,  the  slight  amount  of  mate- 
rial needed;  in  a  special  purse,  have  all  the  coins  that  will  be 
needed.  One  must  have  besides,  two  registers;  in  the  first,  one 
will  inscribe  in  a  column  the  sign  representing  the  result  of  the 
experiment;  in  the  second,  which  is  a  note  book,  will  be  reproduced 
the  replies  in  detail;  one  might,  for  the  second,  have  the  aid  of  a 
secretary,  so  as  to  save  time;  but  this  is  not  indispensable.  The 
first  register  consists  of  a  series  of  large  pages  of  square  paper 
upon  which  is  written  in  advance,  in  a  column  to  the  left,  the 
names  of  the  tests,  grouped  by  age,  in  some  such  form  as  is  repre- 
sented in  our  Table  III.  After  these  names,  rule  as  many  verti- 
cal columns  as  there  are  children  to  be  tested.  Above  each  column 
write  the  name  of  the  pupil.  When  the  pupil  answers  the  test 
write  the  result  in  the  column  opposite  the  test;  this  result  will  be 
expressed  in  the  following  S3mabols:  +  indicates  that  the  test  is 
passed;  —  indicates  failure;  0  indicates  silence;  ?  indicates  that 
the  result  is  doubtful;  if  the  doubtful  result  is  nearer  failure  than 
success,  write  —  ?;  if  on  the  contrary  it  is  nearer  success,  with 
+  ?;  we  also  use  the  sign  +  !  when  the  result  is  excellent,  and  the 
sign  —  !  when  it  is  altogether  bad.  We  advise  putting  the  desired 
sign  as  sooti  as  each  test  is  completed,  and  not  after  the  sitting 
while  re-reading  the  notes  taken.  It  will  be  easily  understood  why 
we  give  this  advice.  Note  that  a  sign  is  not  merely  to  record  auto- 
matically that  which  has  just  transpired,  it  is  truly  to  pass  a 
judgment;  but  the  judgment  stands  the  chance  of  being  exact  just 
in  proportion  as  the  facts  are  recent.  However  detailed  the  notes 
may  be,  they  never  give,  except  in  a  very  incomplete  manner,  all 
the  features  of  an  experiment;  they  contain  an  immense  number  of 
things  understood ;  one  would  therefore  be  wrong  in  placing  confi- 
dence in  them. 


296  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

As  soon  as  the  results  of  the  test  are  marked  by  a  sign,  take  the 
note  book,  and  commence  a  more  detailed  account.  This  must 
contain  the  name  of  the  pupil,  his  age,  date  of  birth,  the  actual 
date,  the  place,  the  number  of  witnesses,  and  every  exceptional 
circumstance  that  could  influence  the  examination.  Very  often 
this  information  is  neglected;  later  when  one  takes  up  the  pages, 
one  no  longer  remembers  what  they  express.  I  advise  noting  also 
the  school  standing  of  the  child,  the  number  of  pupils  in  his  class, 
the  attitude  of  the  pupil  during  the  examination  (natural,  giddy, 
timid,  dull,  undisciplined,  etc.)  and  lastly,  the  social  condition 
of  his  parents  (misery,  poverty,  moderate  circumstances,  ease, 
wealth) .  If  by  chance,  some  important  fact  has  transpired  in  the 
history  of  the  child,  be  sure  to  note  it.  A  certain  little  pupil  of 
nine  years  has  arrived  from  the  country,  and  has  never  been  to 
school;  mention  of  this  is  necessary. 

The  notes  to  be  taken  relative  to  each  child  are  variable ;  it  is, 
above  all,  experience  which  teaches  what  is  useful  to  record.  One 
must  remember  first  of  all  that  a  mere  symbol  is  insufficient,  and 
that  one  must  have  sufficient  notes  in  order  that  another  experi- 
menter may  be  able  to  judge  results  for  himself.  Thus,  the  re- 
plies to  the  questions  of  intelligence,  the  manner  in  which  a  certain 
pupil  has  explained  or  criticized  the  absurdity  of  certain  phrases, 
should  be  written  in  full;  when  digits  are  to  be  repeated,  it  is  well 
to  have  an  invariable  series;  then  one  should  write  the  digits  given 
by  the  pupil  himself;  in  taking  this  precaution,  one  avoids  letting 
interesting  facts  escape.  Example:  one  has  given  the  digits  1, 
3,  9,  2,  7.  The  pupil,  believing  he  is  repeating,  says  1,  3,  4,  5,  6; 
the  error  is  serious,  very  much  more  serious  than  if  he  had  said, 
1,  3,  8,  5,  0;  because  in  the  first  repetition,  he  followed  the  natural 
order  of  figures,  he  has  therefore  impUcitly  admitted  the  absurdity 
that  he  was  asked  to  repeat  figures  in  their  natural  order.  Make 
note  of  this  fact  in  order  to  fix  it  in  the  memory.  The  definition 
of  words  and  things,  the  r^sum^  of  the  sentiment  of  Hervieu,  are 
also  to  be  written  in  full.  In  the  test  of  60  words,  it  is  often  diffi- 
cult to  write  all  the  words  given  by  a  pupil,  because  he  goes  more 
rapidly  than  one  can  write;  one  can  often  make  in  passing  inter- 
esting indications;  for  instance,  one  notes  each  word  by  a  vertical 
mark  and  commences  a  new  group  every  half  minute  (the  total 
experiment  lasts  three  minutes) ;  one  knows  thus  how  many  words 
were  said  in  the  first  half  minute,  how  many  in  the  second,  how 


TEACHERS^   JUDGMENT   OF   PUPILS  297 

many  in  the  third,  etc.  One  can  thus  see  if  the  subject  has  pro- 
gressively increased  or  diminished  the  series  of  words,  and  that 
gives  an  indication  upon  his  faculty  of  work;  I  have  also  the  habit 
of  indicating  the  marks  corresponding  to  the  names  of  objects 
to  be  seen  in  the  room,  and  I  underscore  whenever  the  subject 
employs  a  superior  word  which  does  not  belong  to  current  speech. 
I  also  advise  writing  the  rhymes  found,  or  the  sentence  given 
containing  the  three  words.  In  requiring  all  these  notes  from 
my  collaborator,  I  make  myself  capable  of  judging  with  what 
care  the  experiment  has  been  made.  A  measurement  of  the  intel- 
ligence of  a  child,  which  presents  no  data  but  symbols,  seems  to 
me  not  to  be  trusted;  this  must  not  be  tolerated;  it  encourages 
negligence  and  even  fraud. 

How  Do  Teachers  Judge  the  Intelligence  of  Their  Pupils? 

One  of  my  colleagues,  of  a  very  superior  mind,  but  whose  high 
administrative  fimctions  have  not  perhaps  prepared  him  for  the 
scrupulous  observation  of  small  facts — because  where  one  ob- 
serves from  an  elevated  situation  one  observes  not  only  from 
above,  but  from  afar — reproached  me  amicably,  one  day,  for 
having  taken  too  great  precautions  to  organize  a  measuring  scale 
for  the  intellectual  level.  According  to  him,  I  had  broken  down 
an  unlocked  door.  After  having  cited  certain  of  my  conclusions 
which  seemed  to  him  obvious  even  to  triteness,  he  finished  by 
declaring  that  all  teachers  know  how  to  judge  the  intelligence  of 
their  pupils  without  difficulty. 

Is  he  correct?  I  remember  that  an  intelligent  teacher,  who  for 
a  certain  time  was  a  pupil  of  mine,  gave  as  his  opinion  a  very 
different  idea.  "We  believe,"  he  said,  "that  we  can  judge  of  the 
intelligence  of  a  child;  and  two  months  after  having  begun  the 
class,  we  imagine  that  we  can  give  to  each  child  a  mark  expressing 
the  degree  of  his  intelligence;  but  the  paradoxical  fact  remains, 
that  the  more  we  study  him,  the  less  we  are  sure  of  our  own  judg- 
ment. The  increase  in  the  number  of  these  embarrassing  cases, " 
he  added,  "comes  especially  from  the  contradictory  observations 
to  which  a  prolonged  study  gives  rise.'*  This  opinion  seemed  to 
me  altogether  just,  and  in  perfect  accord  with  my  personal  ex- 
perience. I  have  always  observed  that  when  one  knows  a  person 
but  little,  one  has  a  well  defined  opinion  of  his  grade  of  intelli- 
gence, and  one  believes  him  either  very  intelligent  or  the  reverse. 


298  DEVELOPMENT    OF   INTELLIGENCE 

As  one  knows  him  better,  the  opinion  that  one  forms  is  less 
extreme,  because  the  more  intelligent  appear  less  so,  and  in  the 
less  intelligent  one  almost  always  discovers  slight  manifestations 
of  intelligence  which  make  one  judge  him  less  stupid. 

I  wished  to  know  what  teachers  think  of  their  ability  to  judge 
the  intelligence  of  children.  At  my  request,  M.  Belot,  primary 
instructor  of  Paris,  agreed  to  send  to  his  teachers  a  small  question- 
naire in  which  he  requested  information  upon  the  two  following 
points:  1st.  What  do  you  think  is  the  proportion  of  errors  that 
you  have  committed  in  estimates  you  have  made  of  the  intelli- 
gence of  your  pupils?  2nd.  What  are  the  methods  which  you 
employ  for  arriving  at  an  exact  estimate? 

The  replies  elicited  by  these  questions  have  been  numerous, 
in  the  neighborhood  of  forty,  very  verbose,  some  forming  a 
veritable  memorial  of  8  or  10  pages;  on  an  average,  however,  they 
were  content  with  3  or  4  pages.  The  primary  inspector  in  de- 
livering them  to  me,  remarked  that  I  had  here  found  an  excellent 
means  of  classifying  the  intelligence  of  certain  teachers.  Among 
the  number  were  certain  very  confused  studies;  and  also  pages 
where  a  devout  optimism  was  curiously  displayed;  the  teachers 
believed  that  they  were  never  deceived ! 

In  analyzing  all  these  missives,  I  occupied  myself  first  in  estab- 
lishing an  average  expressing  the  number  of  errors  of  which  the 
teacher  accused  himself.  But  this  is  a  calculation  which  seemed 
to  me,  on  reflection,  thoroughly  useless.  What  advantage  would 
there  be  in  knowing,  for  example,  that  this  average  number  of 
errors  is  1  out  of  8  or  10  pupils?  It  is  only  a  figure,  and  one  does 
not  know  exactly  what  it  represents;  because  we  completely 
ignore  its  origin.  It  is  a  question  of  recognized  errors;  and  how 
many  unrecognized  errors  may  have  been  committed?  One 
correspondent  related  for  example  that  a  young  pupil  had  the 
most  limited  intelligence;  she  was  found  several  years  later  in  a 
notion  store,  in  the  rue  Rivoli,  where  she  was  very  much  appreci- 
ated. ^'Her  amiable  and  gracious  air,  her  lively  and  intelligent 
conversation,"  said  her  teacher,  "convinced  me  anew  that  it  is 
rash  to  say  in  school  that  certain  children  are  devoid  of  intelli- 
gence." Would  our  correspondent  have  known  of  her  error,  if 
chance  had  not  taken  her  to  rue  Rivoli?  And  then,  one  would 
like  to  know  how  far  the  estimate  of  the  teacher  must  deviate 
from  the  truth  before  he  perceives  that  he  has  deceived  himself. 


TEACHEES'   JUDGMENT   OF  PUPILS  299 

If  I  say  of  a  plank  that  it  is  3  m.  45,  and  it  is  afterwards  measured 
before  me,  I  put  myself  under  such  conditions  that  my  error  will 
be  easily  detected.  But  if  I  content  myself  with  saying  that 
this  plank  is  very  long  how  can  the  amount  of  my  error  be  known? 
How  would  it  be  possible  even  to  establish  the  fact  that  I  am  in 
error?  It  is  practically  impossible.  In  order  that  a  statement 
be  subject  to  error,  it  is  necessary  that  it  be  precise;  precision  is 
as  necessary  a  condition  of  truth  as  of  error,  and  consequently  is 
a  necessary  condition  of  verification.  But  I  ask  myself,  did  these 
teachers  when  they  judged  of  the  intelligence  of  their  children 
submit  themselves  to  this  precision?  I  have  read  many  judg- 
ments given  and  I  find  them  of  a  vagueness  that  is  most  dis- 
couraging. They  say  of  a  child  that  he  is  very  intelligent,  or 
''intelligent  enough, '' — and  this  last  term  is  so  very  vague  that 
it  changes  in  value  according  to  the  inflection  of  the  voice — 
or  very  little  intelligent  (still  another  expression  of  the  same  kind) 
or  again,  below  the  average,  and  that  is  all.  Very  many  teachers, 
asked  to  divide  their  classes  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  intelli- 
gence, make  only  3  groups.  With  such  estimates  one  seldom  runs 
the  risk  of  being  found  lacking. 

All  this  leads  me  to  attach  only  a  moderate  importance  to  the 
mean  error  of  J  which  I  have  here  indicated.  That  which  ap- 
pears to  me  more  significant  is  the  disagreement  of  the  teachers; 
it  reduces  itself  here  to  what  one  calls  the  mean  variation. 
While  certain  ones  affirm  that  in  a  career  of  from  ten  to  twenty 
years,  they  have  been  deceived  only  once  or  twice,  which  makes 
the  admirable  percentage  of  1  error  out  of  1000,  others  recognize 
that  one  is  apt  to  be  deceived  once  out  of  every  three  times,  which 
gives  300  for  every  1000!  Such  divergences  of  opinion,  are  much 
more  striking  than  any  average;  and  they  are  the  best  argument 
for  finding  a  precise  and  exact  method  upon  which  everyone  may 
agree. 

Let  us  continue  then  the  analysis  of  our  documents;  having 
seen  the  replies  made  to  the  first  question,  let  us  see  what  is  said 
of  the  second.  We  asked  the  teachers  to  indicate  to  us  how  they 
went  about  establishing  the  intelligence  of  a  child. 

The  question  is  vast  enough  and  vague  enough  for  each  one  to 
be  able  to  develop  at  his  ease  his  manner  of  viewing  the  subject 
and  especially  of  recording  what  he  has  learned  during  his  career 
as  teacher;  the  career,  often  long,  has  given  him  the  opportunity 


300  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

of  studying  the  children  under  the  admirable  conditions  of 
variety  and  of  precision.  I  have  often  thought  that  in  the  brain 
of  every  intelligent  teacher  there  is  a  treasure  consisting  of  ob- 
servations which  have  been  deposited  there  from  day  to  day;  but 
it  is  difficult  to  get  possession  of  this  treasure;  and  he  who  pos- 
sesses it,  often  knows  neither  its  value  nor  its  use.  By  extremely 
skillful  questions  one  might  perhaps  obtain  from  each  teacher 
something  of  his  knowledge. 

I  have  read  and  re-read  all  the  replies  to  our  questionnaire, 
classifying  them,  passing  judgment  upon  them,  discarding  those 
that  were  pointless,  simply  verbose,  or  too  clearly  inspired  by 
manuals  of  psychology,  keeping  only  those  which  indicated  per- 
sonal observations,  acuteness  of  insight  and  actual  effort.  It 
seemed  to  me  after  reading  them  and  trying  to  make  a  synthesis 
of  all  they  contained,  that  these  diverse  replies  gave  information 
upon  two  different  points.  On  the  one  hand  were  scattered 
observations,  half  conscious,  upon  the  signs  of  intelligence  of 
children,  which  one  perceives  without  hunting  for  them;  and 
on  the  other  hand  certain  precise  methodical  operations,  more 
nearly  resembling  tests. 

Our  question  related  to  the  intelligence  but  it  did  not  demand  a 
definition.  Seldom  did  the  teachers  recognize  this  point  of 
distinction.  One  school  mistress,  somewhat  naive,  has  carelessly 
written  that  intelhgence  consists  in  the  faculty  of  acquiring 
instruction.  This  is  to  confound  intelhgence  and  memory,  that 
is  to  say  the  whole  with  the  part,  it  is  to  see  in  the  child  nothing 
but  the  pupil.  Others  have  reduced  the  intelligence  to  the  faculty 
of  knowing  and  understanding;  still  another  definition  of  the 
whole  by  the  part,  and  this  definition  is  worse  than  the  other 
because  it  fails  to  recognize  the  purpose  of  the  intelligence,  that 
which  forms  its  utility.  Another  definition  worth  repeating  is 
that  which  sees  the  intelligence  in  the  faculty  of  making  use  of 
acquired  matter  in  a  way  to  produce  new  ideas.  The  one  who 
expressed  this  thought,  wished  to  react  against  the  tendency,  so 
common  among  masters  of  routine,  to  confound  the  intelligence 
with  memory;  but  this  point  of  view  is  too  restricted.  To  produce 
new  ideas  is  not  the  only  function  of  the  intelligence;  there  are 
very  original  minds  which  lack  balance;  and  fantastic  dreamers, 
who  certainly  find  what  is  new,  cannot  be  taken  as  models  of 
intelligence.     It  would  be  better  to  say  that  the  intelligence 


teachers'  judgment  of  pupils  301 

serves  in  the  discovery  of  truth.  But  the  conception  is  still  too 
narrow;  and  we  return  to  our  favorite  theory;  the  intelligence 
marks  itself  by  the  best  possible  adaptation  of  the  individual 
to  his  environment;  this  is  what  one  school  mistress  has  very 
cleverly  understood.  She  recounts  how  she  made  an  error  in  the 
case  of  a  young  girl,  who  learned  badly  in  the  class,  and  who  had 
passed  for  stupid  but  who  afterwards  proved  her  intelligence  by 
her  practical  sense  of  life.  And  the  teacher  adds,  ''The  intelli- 
gence not  only  serves  to  learn,  above  all  it  serves  to  live  (a  faire 
sa  vie)."  What  a  beautiful  expression,  how  picturesque  and 
true!  In  speaking  of  one's  adaptation  to  one's  surroundings  we 
mean  just  that. 

Our  teachers  therefore  passed  in  review  all  the  signs  of  intelli- 
gence which  they  knew,  and  in  making  a  synthesis  of  the  replies 
one  obtains  a  very  exhaustive  table  of  these  signs.  Only,  we 
shall  continually  show  that  these  signs  are  indeed  subject  to 
caution.  One  teacher  says  the  intelligence  of  a  child  can  be 
judged  indirectly  by  heredity.  Intelligent  parents  have  intelli- 
gent children,  ''especially"  she  adds,  "when  they  are  young." 
Here  we  perhaps  have  to  make  reservations;  these  questions  of 
heredity  are  still  but  little  known;  and  we  could  object  that  one 
encounters  backward  children  in  families  where  the  brothers  and 
sisters  are  normal;  with  still  stronger  reason  one  may  expect  to 
find  families  where  the  intelligence  varies;  if  the  observation  of 
teachers  corresponds  to*  a  general  rule,  which  is  possible,  how 
many  exceptions!  It  seems  that  in  reality,  teachers  are  attached 
to  the  idea  of  the  influence  of  heredity.  If  they  hesitate  upon  the 
intelligence  of  a  child,  they  draw  an  argument  from  the  fact  that 
a  brother  is  not  very  intelligent  or  is  backward,  or  on  the  contrary 
brilliant  in  his  studies.  But  let  us  come  to  the  child  himself. 
Occasionally,  teachers  take  into  consideration  the  form  of  his 
head;  ordinarily  they  take  no  notice  of  this,  and  the  reason  is 
that  malformed  heads  are  quite  rare.  The  attention  attaches 
itself  more  to  the  manner  of  conducting  themselves;  embarrass- 
ment is  an  unfavorable  sign.  The  physiognomy  above  all  is 
considered  important. 

This  is  a  point  to  which  they  constantly  return.  The  intelli- 
gent child  has  an  open,  awakened,  mobile  countenance;  another 
expression  is  that  the  countenance  is  sympathetic.  But  how  take 
accoimt  of  this?    How  define  it?    How  be  certain  of  not  de- 


302  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

ceiving  oneself  either  in  judging  it  intelligent  or  otherwise,  or  in 
drawing  from  it  a  conclusion?  With  equal  frequency  the  eyes 
and  expression  are  spoken  of.  The  glance  of  the  intelligent  is 
quick,  that  of  the  unintelligent  is  dull.  ''There  are  eyes  awakened 
and  deep!"  One  teacher  writes  that  the  first  have  an  active 
look,  and  the  other  a  passive  look.  One  can  understand  about 
what  she  wishes  to  express;  she  means  to  speak  of  the  activity  of 
the  intelligent  type  which  causes  them  not  only  to  follow  the 
lesson,  but  to  go  in  advance  of  the  questions;  and  this  activity 
can  be  read  in  the  expression.  We  do  not  contradict;  but  how 
shall  we  replace  this  intuition  by  a  clear  description?  We  do 
not  see  the  means.  Furthermore,  one  would  be  wrong  to  place 
confidence  in  these  impressions,  because  certain  teachers  see  a 
world  in  the  countenance  of  a  child  and  we  at  once  become 
suspicious.  One  mistress  writes,  "While  recounting  to  children 
an  interesting  or  touching  fact,  it  is  extremely  important  to  ob- 
serve their  expressions  which  seem  to  me  a  sure  revelation  of  the 
state  of  their  intelligence.  All  are  interested  and  upon  all  faces 
one  reads  a  keen  attention;  but  while  the  eyes  of  most  of  them 
express  simply  naivete,  curiosity  or  a  slight  emotion,  a  few  show 
an  acuteness  or  a  depth  of  penetration  which  reveals  a  superior 
nature."  That  is  well  said  and  well  felt.  But  by  what  precise 
detail  can  one  recognize  the  depth  of  the  expression,  and  distin- 
guish it  from  simple  curiosity?  Besides  more  than  one  teacher 
puts  us  on  our  guard  against  such  interpretations,  as  being  super- 
ficial. "Open,  animated,  expressive  countenances  rarely  belong 
to  unintelligent  pupils.  Nevertheless  one  is  sometimes  deceived; 
these  lively,  penetrating  subjects  lack  depth  and  solidity,  while 
a  passive  countenance,  sometimes  almost  without  expression, 
may  hide  reflection,  and  judgment,  that  are  discovered  little  by 
little."  One  teacher  writes,  "I  have  found  myself  deceived  by 
children  with  dainty,  agreeable  faces  and  bright  eyes  who  gave 
the  impression  of  being  intelligent,  but  who  are  not  so.  Never- 
theless this  impression  which  a  casual  visitor  might  experience 
cannot  hold  sway  long  over  the  every  day  teacher."  Still  more 
precise  is  the  following  observation:  "There  are  countenances 
which  are  expressionless  and  gloomy;  one  never  obtains  from  these 
children  an  intelligent  answer;  the  lessons  are  badly  learned; 
they  are  nevertheless  strong  in  composition  and  arithmetic.  On 
the  contrary  one  may  be  deceived  by  open,  frank,  wide  awake 


303 

countenances;  one  obtains  good  oral  replies;  their  choice  of  words 
is  good;  but  they  are  children  incapable  of  sustained  attention, 
and  characterized  by  an  absolute  lack  of  ability  in  arithmetic/' 
These  affirmations,  these  correctives,  and  these  vague  impressions 
compose  something  very  difficult  to  define.  The  master  is 
influenced  by  an  open  face,  a  quick  glance,  and  above  all  by  a 
sympathetic  manner.  He  says  that,  without  doubt,  that  child 
is  intelligent.  All  the  same  he  is  obliged  to  add  under  his  breath 
one  or  even  many  ''buts;"  and  then  one  does  not  know  exactly 
what  remains  of  the  first  statement. 

We  are  also  told  that  one  must  observe  children  during  play. 
In  class  they  are  immobile  and  unnatural  because  of  discipline. 
In  the  school  yard,  they  are  free,  and  become  more  natural, 
and  the  recreation  period  with  its  play,  its  movement,  its  com- 
radeship and  its  combats,  brings  them  nearer  to  real  life.  It  is 
at  this  moment  that  one  gets  an  insight  into  their  personality,  their 
character.  One  of  the  best  teachers  writes  me  that  two  principal 
elements  serve  him  in  discovering  whether  a  child  is  intelligent 
or  not;  his  replies  in  class,  and  the  way  he  plays.  There  are  a 
hundred  ways  of  playing.  Some  children  do  not  know  how  to 
play.  This  is  a  sign  of  low  intelligence.  It  is  true  that  some 
intelligent  children  isolate  themselves  in  the  yards  and  never 
play;  but  that  does  not  prove  an  incapacity.  One  may  note  the 
aptitudes  of  the  children  in  their  manner  of  playing;  there  is  an 
unintelligent  way;  it  is  where  imitation  predominates;  true 
intelligence  manifests  itself  by  initiative  and  creation.  We  do 
not  contradict;  a  school  yard,  like  the  street,  is  a  marvelous 
field  for  observation;  and  we  can  understand  that  one  might 
remain  there  hours  and  hours  observing;  but  nothing  of  that  is 
described,  especially  is  nothing  tabulated;  it  is  not  sufficient  to 
observe,  one  must  interpret  what  one  sees,  and  the  manner  of 
obtaining  a  just  interpretation  has  not  been  indicated. 

All  these  are  only  incidents  at  the  threshold.  According  to 
the  majority  of  our  correspondents,  it  is  especially  in  the  class 
room  that  one  judges  of  the  intelligence  of  each  child.  The 
master  is  there  to  dispense  instruction;  it  is  therefore  quite 
natural  that  his  attention  should  be  fixed  upon  that  instruction; 
and  following  the  manner  in  which  this  instruction  is  received 
by  the  child,  the  judgment  of  good  or  bad  is  passed  upon  him. 
In  principle  he  is  not  wrong.     The  school  child  is  there  to  learn; 


304  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

if  he  does  not  learn,  or  if  he  learns  poorly,  he  fails  in  his  task,  he 
is  at  fault,  and  his  intellectual  insufficiency  may  be  the  cause  of 
that  failure.  Let  us  imagine  a  master  who  is  in  charge  of  an 
elementary  class;  the  benches  are  filled  with  little  tots  of  six  or 
eight  years;  his  principal  task  is  to  teach  them  to  read;  this  will  be 
the  great  work  of  his  scholastic  year;  and  according  to  the  manner 
in  which  each  pupil  acquits  himself  in  this  regard,  he  will  be  judged. 
If  he  encounters  a  child  who,  in  spite  of  two  years  of  assiduous 
training,  is  still  unable  to  pronounce  syllables  correctly,  he  will 
pass  an  unfavorable  judgment  upon  that  pupil;  and  thus  for  all; 
the  sum  of  their  knowledge,  compared  with  their  age  and  attend- 
ance at  school,  furnishes  the  principal  criterion  for  the  appreci- 
ation. The  instruction  therefore  answers  for  the  intelligence, 
but  we  very  well  understand  that  this  idea  is  only  approximately 
correct;  there  are  minds  which  rebel  at  reading;  there  are  intel- 
lectual aptitudes  which  cannot  develop  in  class,  and  which  will 
never  take  a  scholastic  form. 

And  to  speak  of  older  pupils,  it  is  incontestable  that  their 
knowledge  is  not  a  measure  of  their  intelligence.  In  reality, 
knowledge  represents  only  the  intelligence  of  others;  there  is  some 
merit  in  having  assimilated  it;  this  proves  first,  memory,  then 
attention,  comprehension,  work,  method;  but  many  intellectual 
qualities  are  not  comprised  in  the  list.  Many  of  the  correspond- 
ents have  realized  this,  and  they  have  endeavored  to  distinguish 
instruction  from  intelligence.  In  the  examples  which  they  give, 
in  the  methods  which  they  advise,  they  especially  strive  to  elimi- 
nate memory.  Memory  is  the  grand  simulator  of  intelligence. 
When  a  child  makes  an  ingenious  reply,  finds  a  witty  word,  or 
gives  a  just  appreciation,  one  must  ask  what  is  original  in  the 
reply,  and  what  is  taken  from  the  book  he  has  read.  We  must 
credit  him  only  with  what  belongs  to  him  personally. 

It  is  curious  to  see  how  teachers  have  sought  to  apply  this 
principle.  It  is  not  easy.  In  the  execution,  difficulties  of  every 
sort  show  themselves. 

Without  doubt,  one  must  take  account  of  the  activity  which 
a  child  shows  in  class.  Those  who  have  the  taste  for  study, 
those  who  love  to  be  questioned,  those  who  reply  well,  those  who 
go  in  advance  of  the  question  will  be  marked  favorably.  The 
rapidity  of  comprehension  is  also  a  good  sign;  but  one  must  not 
allow  himself  to  be  deceived.    There  are  children  who  seem  to 


305 

understand  and  scarcely  ask  any  questions,  because  they  content 
themselves  with  nearly  understanding.  "This  year  I  have  a 
little  girl  who  makes  me  repeat  my  explanations  twice,  and  she 
is  nevertheless  the  first  in  the  class;  but  she  asks  me  to  repeat 
because  she  wishes  thoroughly  to  understand  while  the  others 
think  they  have  understood.  Unintelligent  children  are  not 
able  to  recognize  at  what  point  in  the  explanation  they  no  longer 
understand,  so  that  often  it  is  the  most  intelligent  who  say  'I 
do  not  understand.'"  One  with  justice  attributes  intelligence 
to  those  who  make  sensible  progress.  Only,  let  us  remark  that 
the  absence  of  progress  may  result  from  the  lack  of  a  special 
aptitude. 

Certain  children,  to  whom  the  ordinary  work  of  the  class  is 
distasteful,  make  compensation  in  manual  work,  sewing,  designing, 
writing;  little  girls  weak  in  orthography,  are  strong  in  sewing 
and  capable  in  the  instruction  concerning  housekeeping;  and, 
all  things  considered,  this  is  more  important  for  their  future. 
In  certain  matters  of  instruction,  it  has  seemed  that  one  could 
easily  distinguish  between  the  part  played  by  memory  and  by 
reasoning.  Arithmetic  has  often  been  cited.  Mental  arith- 
metic furnishes  a  means  of  judging.  By  the  way  in  which  the 
child  handles  it,  by  the  ingenuity  of  his  methods,  judge  of  his 
intelligence.  In  the  discussion  of  problems,  one  easily  sees  who 
understands  and  who  knows  how  to  connect  ideas.  Teachers 
zealous  for  mathematics,  think  that  every  intelligent  child  ought 
to  excel  in  arithmetic,  and  that  the  converse  is  equally  true; 
that  is  to  say  that  any  one  strong  in  arithmetic  is  intelligent; 
he  may  lack  memory,  but  not  the  power  of  reasoning.  We  think 
this  is  an  error.  In  the  first  place,  no  account  is  made  of  the 
diversity  of  aptitudes.  A  certain  writer,  and  also  a  certain 
politician  whom  we  know,  comprehend  nothing  in  mathematics; 
they  are  not,  however,  blockheads.  In  the  school  one  sees 
certain  pupils  who  are  strong  in  arithmetic  but  who  seize  a 
grammatical  application  or  get  the  sense  from  a  history  lesson 
with  difiiculty;  there  is  a  lack  then  of  intelligence  on  certain 
sides,  but  one  cannot  say  absolutely  that  he  is  not  intelligent. 
Another  difficulty.  How  can  we  distinguish  between  mathe- 
matical knowledge  and  mathematical  intelligence?  One  who 
knows  a  great  deal,  helps  himself  by  means  of  the  memory  of  prob- 
lems analogous  to  those  proposed  to  him;  while  he  who  is  very 


306  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

ignorant,  would  be  stopped  by  the  undeveloped  state  of  his 
faculties,  and  through  the  want  of  certain  indispensable  ideas. 

Can  one  judge  of  the  intelligence  of  a  child  by  his  success  in 
history?  No,  the  difficulties  are  analogous;  granted  that  the 
dates  are  banished,  and  that  one  avoids  even  the  recitations 
which  can  be  learned  by  heart  and  which  make  use  chiefly  of  the 
memory.  One  questions  the  child,  not  upon  what  he  knows 
but  upon  what  he  thinks.  This  is  the  ideal:  lead  him  to  judge, 
oblige  him  to  express  some  personal  opinion.  But,  besides  its 
being  ridiculous  to  make  such  demands  of  little  children,  how 
difficult  it  is  to  know  if  the  child,  who  gives  us  his  ideas  of  a  war, 
or  of  a  great  man  or  an  historical  act,  is  not  simply  the  faithful 
echo  of  the  teaching  of  the  master!  After  having  sent  me  re- 
flections analogous  to  the  preceding,  a  school  mistress  wrote  me : 
"In  reality,  very  few  children  understand  history.^'  Another 
teacher  seemed  to  find  in  the  lessons  of  history  much  information 
regarding  the  mentality  of  her  pupils;  I  asked  her  to  send  me  some 
documents  to  support  her  opinion.  She  asked  her  pupils  of 
from  ten  to  twelve  years  to  express  in  writing  their  opinion  on 
Napoleon  I.  One  of  these  wrote,  ''Napoleon  I  was  the  greatest 
warrior  that  ever  existed;  but  his  pride  has  made  the  name  of 
France  long  detested  by  foreigners.  His  ambition  cost  the  lives 
of  half  a  million  Frenchmen."  This  is  very  well.  But  let 
us  read  what  another  pupil  wrote,  ''Napoleon  I  was  a  great 
warrior,  but  his  pride  attracted  the  anger  of  the  people  of  Europe 
against  France.  He  left  France  smaller  than  he  found  it.  One 
must  admire  his  military  genius,  but  one  must  blame  his  indomi- 
table pride.  '^  These  two  opinions  resemble  each  other  too  closely 
not  to  be  the  reproduction  of  the  opinion  of  the  teacher.  What 
vanity  to  suppose  that  such  young  children  could  be  capable 
of  judging  Napoleon!  I  have  also  been  the  recipient  of  short 
essays,  where  the  children  of  twelve  or  fourteen  years  had  been 
asked  what  they  thought  of  the  Revocation  of  the  Edict  of 
Nantes,  or  the  Partition  of  Poland.  Naturally,  as  to  writing, 
orthography,  punctuation,  style,  these  attempts  differed  a  little 
one  from  the  other  and  it  would  be  possible  to  draw  from  these 
slight  differences  some  arguments;  but  the  foundation,  that  is  to 
say  the  opinion  emitted,  seemed  to  me  to  be  the  same  for  all, 
and  consequently  very  suspicious.  All  the  children  agree  in 
seeing  a  fault  in  the  Revocation  of  the  Edict  of  Nantes,  and  a 


teachers'  judgment  of  pupils  307 

theft  in  the  Partition  of  Poland.  These  are  not  personal  historical 
judgments. 

Again  a  certain  singular  aptitude  has  been  pointed  out,  which 
a  few  pupils  present,  of  correctly  following  the  orthography  in 
use;  it  is  what  is  called  natural  orthography.  So  much  the 
better  for  those  who  possess  it;  it  spares  them  a  great  deal  of 
troublesome  effort.  But  one  cannot  make  from  it  a  general  sign 
of  intelligence.  The  aptitude  for  orthography  is  a  special  gift, 
very  limited,  like  an  accurate  ear  or  voice.  A  correspondent 
makes  the  following  reasonable  remark:  "Certain  children  seem 
to  have  natural  orthography,  which  is  in  reality  the  memory  for 
written  words,  and  make  but  few  mistakes  although  they  scarcely 
reflect  while  writing;  they  are  incapable  of  comprehending  the 
results  of  reasoning  in  a  problem  and  even  in  the  grammar  grades 
there  are  those  who  cannot  distinguish  when  to  subtract  and 
when  to  add. " 

Certain  correspondents  attach  great  importance  to  expression  or 
rather,  if  I  understand  them  rightly,  to  expressive  reading,  which 
is  not  altogether  the  same  thing;  one  can  have  expression  badly 
governed,  breathe  badly,  have  a  rude  voice,  pronounce  badly, 
mutilate  the  words  and  possess,  nevertheless,  an  expressive  read- 
ing. Therefore,  in  order  to  judge  of  the  intelligence  of  a  child, 
one  must  give  him  a  selection  that  is  within  his  reach,  and  watch 
his  reading  with  care.  The  inteUigent  child,  says  a  teacher, 
makes  one  feel  the  punctuation.  The  intelligent  child,  it  is  said 
again,  reads  with  the  sense  of  the  text;  he  understands  not  only 
the  general  sense  but  the  shades  of  meaning;  and  he  not  only 
understands  what  he  reads  but  he  feels  it.  This  is  all  very  true; 
and  every  one  is  favorably  impressed  by  expressive  reading  and 
pleased  with  the  little  reader.  It  is  only  necessary  to  listen  to 
children  as  they  talk  to  judge  of  their  intelligence;  certain  among 
them  have  fine  intonations  of  voice  which  indicate  even  at  this 
early  age,  different  shades  of  meaning.  But  in  what  embarrass- 
ment one  would  be  placed  if  one  attempted,  out  of  these  fugitive 
and  vague  impressions,  to  pass  a  precise  judgment!  In  the  first 
place  one  would  be  obliged  to  eliminate  those  who  cannot  read 
or  who  read  poorly,  because  they  have  defective  habits,  faulty 
pronunciation,  and  cannot  yet  read  fluently;  in  a  primary  school, 
one  would  be  obliged  for  this  reason,  to  abstain  from  judging 
more  than  half  of  the  children. 


308  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

As  for  those  who  have  the  good  fortune  to  possess  an  expressive 
reading,  they  are  often  the  intelUgent  ones;  but  take  care;  often 
they  are  only  artists,  future  actors;  one  knows  by  illustrious 
examples  that  an  actor  may  be  very  talented,  without  possessing 
a  great  intelligence;  in  the  school,  I  have  sometimes  had  pointed 
out  to  me  children  of  a  noticeable  lack  of  intelligence  who  put 
a  charming  expression  into  their  oral  reading. 

I  will  terminate  this  review,  by  noting  that  for  many  teachers, 
the  surest  and  the  most  direct  means  for  judging  the  intelligence 
of  a  child  is  to  put  questions  to  him,  to  make  him  talk.  In  the 
class  one  questions  him  in  such  a  way  as  to  solicit  a  personal 
reply,  a  reply  which  does  not  come  from  the  book.  There  is  an 
excellent  exercise,  so  it  seems,  that  of  explained  reading.  When 
the  child  has  read  a  passage  stop  him  to  sum  up  the  essential 
idea  of  the  selection,  or  to  criticise  it;  still  better,  lead  him  by 
questions  to  reveal  what  he  has  seen,  observed,  felt,  noted,  re- 
flected outside  school.  Appeal  to  his  judgment,  to  his  imagi- 
nation or  again,  leaving  the  reading  book,  question  the  child  dur- 
ing recreation;  gain  his  confidence,  make  him  talk;  show  an  interest 
in  his  response,  and  question  him  upon  his  future  projects,  upon 
his  friendships,  his  duties,  his  life  at  home.  Freed  from  the 
constraint  of  the  class,  certain  minds  open,  and  thus  one  makes 
unexpected  discoveries.  This  is  the  charm  of  confidences;  a 
silent  child  begins  talking;  one  finds  that  he  is  full  of  imagination, 
and  often  of  mischief.  One  sees  that  another,  strong  in  composi- 
tion, has  never  used  his  powers  of  observation.  Again  it  is  the 
spontaneous  reflections  of  the  child  which  indicate  his  intelli- 
gence. Here  is  one  who  asks  his  master  ''Why  do  people  of  warm 
countries  in  summer  wear  clothing  made  of  wool,''  or  ''Since  the 
earth  turns,  why  are  not  the  houses  upset?"  Another  makes  the 
following  remark.  He  had  been  told  ''The  oleomargerine  is  good 
and  is  less  costly  than  butter."  He  replied,  "The  bakers  must 
use  it  then  in  their  cakes."  Another,  to  whom  it  had  been 
explained  that  Bonaparte  left  the  army  in  Egypt  to  return  to 
France,  repHed,  "He  had  no  right  to  do  it,  they  ought  to  have 
shot  him."  Certainly  these  words,  these  reflections  denote  a 
keen  intelligence,  especially  if  the  child  is  young  and  the  saying 
is  authentic,  but  the  inconvenience  of  these  remarks  is,  that  they 
are  spontaneous,  that  one  has  not  been  able  to  foresee  them,  nor 
to  judge  them  beforehand,  and  consequently  one  does  not  know 


teachers'  judgment  of  pupils  309 

exactly  what  quality  of  intelligence  they  contain.  To  appreci- 
ate them,  one  experiences  the  same  embarrassment  as  in  the 
clinic,  when  a  lunatic  of  a  low  intellectual  level,  utters  a  speech 
whose  form  seems  intelligent;  yet  one  does  not  exactly  know  if 
this  speech  reveals  a  former  state  of  intelHgence  of  which  it  is  a 
relic,  or  if  it  might  come  from  an  imbecile.  In  the  same  way, 
when  one  undertakes  to  appreciate  the  value  of  a  childish  saying 
which  has  come  spontaneously,  one  lacks  a  measure,  a  point  of 
comparison  by  which  to  judge. 

A  teacher,  whom  I  know,  who  is  methodical  and  considerate, 
has  given  an  account  of  the  habits  he  has  formed  for  studying 
his  pupils;  he  has  analysed  his  methods,  and  sent  them  to  me. 
They  have  nothing  original,  which  m^kes  them  all  the  more 
important.  He  instructs  children  from  five  and  a  half  to  seven 
and  a  half  years  old;  they  are  35  in  number;  they  come  to  his 
class  after  having  passed  a  preparatory  course,  where  they  have 
commenced  to  learn  to  read.  For  judging  each  child,  the  teacher 
takes  account  of  his  age,  his  previous  schooUng  (the  child  may 
have  been  one  year,  two  years  in  the  preparatory  class,  or  else 
never  passed  through  that  division  at  all),  of  his  expression  of 
countenance,  his  state  of  health,  his  knowledge,  his  attitude  in 
class,  and  his  repHes.  From  these  diverse  elements  he  forms  an 
opinion.  I  have  transcribed  some  of  these  notes  on  the  follow- 
ing page. 

These  judgments  were  passed  by  the  teacher  in  the  beginning; 
out  of  35  pupils  he  judged  31,  having  reserved  4  upon  whom  he 
could  not  pronounce.  At  the  end  of  the  year  his  indecisions  and  re- 
serves had  increased;  they  now  rested  upon  9  children;  and  besides, 
he  had  changed  his  opinion  about  8.  In  reading  these  judgments 
one  can  see  how  his  opinion  was  formed,  and  of  how  many  ele- 
ments it  took  account;  it  seems  to  us  that  this  detail  is  interesting; 
perhaps  if  one  attempted  to  make  it  precise  by  giving  coefficients 
to  all  these  remarks,  one  would  realize  still  greater  exactitude. 
But  is  it  possible  to  define  precisely  an  attitude,  a  physiognomy, 
interesting  replies,  animated  eyes?  It  seems  that  in  all  this  the 
best  element  of  diagnosis  is  furnished  by  the  degree  of  reading 
which  the  child  has  attained,  after  a  given  number  of  months, 
and  that  the  rest  remains  constantly  vague. 

Is  this  equivalent  to  saying  that  the  empirical  method  of  knowl- 
edge, which  we  have  here  brought  to  trial,  presents  no  advantage? 


310 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 


NAME    OF 
THE     CHILD 

AGE 

U 

Hi 

FACTS  NOTED 

CONCLUSION 

Dess 

71 

2 

Does  not  know  how  to  read  in 
spite  of  2  years  of  schooling. 

Below  the  average 

Mont 

7 

0 

Ignorant,  timid,  does  not  reply. 

Below  the  average 

Par 

7 

0 

Ignorant,   embarrassed  manner. 
Comes  from  the  country. 

Below  the  average 

Mene 

6^ 

0 

Ignorant,     expressionless    face. 
Does  not  reply. 

Below  the  average 

Lai 

6i 

0 

Unintelligent  face.  Does  not  re- 
ply to  questions.    A   brother 
remained  until  he  was  13  in  an 
elementary  class. 

Below  the  average 

Devo 

7 

1 

Child  stupid,  sleepy.    Does  not 
reply.    Some  of  the  elements  of 
reading. 

Below  the  average 

Dopf 

61 

0 

Unintelligent    face,  expression- 
less, small,  weakly,  brutal. 

Below  the  average 

Duval 

61 

1 

Elements  of  reading.    Child  dif- 
ficult to  interest. 

Average 

Drou 

7 

2 

Elements  of  reading.    Heedless. 
Lack  of  care  probable  cause  of 
retardation. 

Average 

Subi 

6 

1 

Fluent   reading.     Awkward  re- 
plies.   Face  wide  awake  and 
animated. 

Average 

Bonnet — 

6 

0 

Ignorant.   Interesting  replies. 

Average 

Berma 

6 

1 

Cannot  read,  but  young,   open 
countenance  keen  look,  easy  to 
interest. 

Average 

Besse 

6^ 

1 

Reads  by  syllables.    Easy  to  in- 
terest.  Air  alert. 

Superior 

Heissle — 

7i 

1 

Reads  by  syllables.    Replies  of- 
ten.   Heedless. 

Superior 

May 

Qh 

1 

Fluent  reading.    Quick  glance. 
Interest  easy  to  excite.    Re- 
plies well. 

Superior 

Dub 

61 

1 

Expressive  reading.     Face  ani- 
mated. 

Superior 

Belile 

6 

0 

Ignorant,  but  child  quick   and 
animated. 

Superior 

teachers'  judgment  of  pupils  311 

Oh  yes,  it  presents  one  very  great  advantage.  It  is  based  upon 
long  observation,  continued  during  weeks  and  months;  if  the 
facts  observed  have  not  each  a  great  value,  on  the  other  hand  they 
are  numerous,  diverse,  and  when  needful  they  correct  one  another. 
Herein  hes  the  incontestable  superiority  of  observation  over  the 
test;  the  latter  is  an  experiment;  moreover  a  short  experiment, 
which,  therefore,  contains  a  certain  element  of  chance.  If  it  is 
a  question  of  judging  the  ability  of  a  child  in  composition,  I 
prefer  ten  tests  to  one;  I  prefer  ten  tests  distributed  over  an  entire 
year  rather  than  grouped  together,  if  the  thing  were  possible, 
in  one  afternoon. 

But  on  the  other  hand  what  indecision  in  the  observation! 
What  errors !  One  rarely  arrives  at  certainty  and  never  at  a  measure. 

So  much  for  observations;  let  us  now  speak  of  experiments. 
The  teachers  have  made  several;  and  we  are  going  to  examine 
them  closely.  In  the  first  place,  to  reply  to  our  question,  certain 
of  our  correspondents  have  sent  in  fragments  of  questions  to  put 
to  the  child.  Here  are  some  of  them:  "Why  do  you  love  your 
parents?  Why  is  the  department  of  the  Seine-Inf^rieure  so 
called?  Three  persons  take  seven  hours  to  do  a  piece  of  work; 
would  five  persons  require  more  or  less  time?  If  any  one  asked 
you  to  choose  between  a  quarter  of  a  pie,  or  the  half  of  a  pie, 
which  would  you  choose?  In  a  square,  which  is  the  longer  side? 
Which  is  the  heavier,  a  kilogram  of  lead  or  of  feathers?  What 
could  you  buy  with  a  1  franc  piece?  Which  would  you  prefer, 
two  pieces  of  5-francs  or  one  gold  10-franc  piece?*'  A  teacher 
tells  me  that  every  year,  in  order  to  know  his  new  pupils  better, 
he  makes  use  of  some  simple  test  questions ;  he  has  them  give  an 
opinion  upon  some  fact  of  current  life,  describe  an  object  placed 
before  their  eyes;  he  has  them  learn  by  heart  a  text  of  a  dozen 
lines  in  as  short  a  time  as  possible;  he  has  them  make  a  map 
allowing  them  all  the  time  necessary. 

There  would  be  indeed  some  criticisms  to  make  upon  these 
tests;  the  principal  of  these  is  the  following:  These  tests  im- 
fortunately  presuppose  that  in  order  to  make  a  satisfactory  reply, 
the  child  has  had  a  certain  amount  of  instruction;  one  must  know 
a  little  geography,  a  little  arithmetic,  to  comprehend  most  of 
them;  and  a  child  who  has  never  been  made  familiar  with  frac- 
tions, nor  with  the  rule  of  three,  neither  with  a  definition  of  a 
square,  would  find  himself  embarrassed  without  his  intelligence 


312  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

being  at  fault.  But  these  are  slight,  very  slight  defects,  that 
could  easily  be  effaced.  We  have  here  the  true  method;  and  the 
teachers  who  sent  us  these  questions  and  tests  were  no  doubt 
unconscious  of  this.  It  is  the  true  method  for  the  following 
reasons:  (1)  the  problems  are  experimentally  put;  it  is  no  longer 
a  question  of  observation  when  one  waits  for  a  time  when  some 
happy  expression  may  escape  the  child;  one  provokes  his  reply 
at  the  necessary  moment,  which  is  the  indispensable  condition 
for  an  examination  of  the  intellectual  level;  (2)  the  questions 
have  nothing  personal  to  the  child;  consequently  one  could  give 
them  indiscriminately  to  all.  What  is  now  necessary,  is  that 
by  a  prolonged  investigation  one  determines  how  children  of 
different  ages  reply  to  these  questions,  in  order  that  the  difficulty 
be  classified  and  that  one  may  have  a  point  from  which  to  measure. 
At  my  request,  three  teachers  came  and  spent  the  afternoon 
in  our  laboratory  rue  Grange-aux-Belles,  and  we  asked  them  each 
to  examine  the  intelligence  of  five  children  whom  they  did  not 
know.  They  had  full  liberty  to  conduct  the  examination  as  they 
thought  best.  They  put  to  the  children  different  interesting 
questions.  I  was  present,  and  noted  several  of  these.  Thus, 
since  in  the  neighborhood  of  the  school  there  is  a  canal  with 
locks,  one  mistress  wished  to  know  if  the  children  understood 
what  a  lock  was,  what  purpose  it  served,  and  what  was  its  mechan- 
ism. The  question  thus  put,  seemed  to  me  curious,  and  the 
interrogation  laborious;  the  teacher  did  not  put  exactly  the  same 
question  to  all,  she  aided  some  more  than  others;  and  besides, 
this  was  a  purely  local  question,  it  could  not  have  been  asked  in 
another  school,  and  this  is  wrong  for  it  makes  comparison  im- 
possible. Another  teacher  had  brought  pretty  pictures,  which 
he  showed  the  children,  then  he  asked  them  diverse  questions 
about  the  objects  there  represented,  for  instance,  why  a  certain 
roof  was  a  mansard  and  not  an  ordinary  roof,  and  how  one  dis- 
tinguished a  mansard.  Excellent  idea,  but  it  was  badly  carried 
out.  In  the  first  place,  the  questions  seemed  to  me  too  easy; 
then  they  changed  from  one  child  to  another;  lastly,  the  teacher 
wasted  time  in  teaching  those  who  answered  badly.  During  one 
of  the  examinations,  blows  of  a  hammer  were  heard;  they  came 
from  a  factory  that  was  in  process  of  construction.  One  teacher 
profited  from  it  by  asking  if  it  were  better  when  building  a  factory. 
to  have  thick  or  thin  walls;  too  local  a  question  in  the  first  place. 


teachers'  judgment  of  pupils  313 

and  not  given  in  the  same  terms  to  all;  and  above  all  the  form 
requiring  yes  or  no  for  answer  was  used,  which  is  dangerous; 
because  the  correct  reply  to  such  a  question  may  be  due  to  chance. 
Ask  a  pupil  if  blood  is  acid  or  alkaline,  and  there  is  one  chance  out 
of  two  that  he  will  reply  correctly  even  though  he  be  perfectly 
ignorant.  Then  they  asked  questions  about  the  streets  of  the 
neighborhood,  about  the  way  to  go  from  one  place  to  another, 
in  order  to  find  out  if  the  children  knew  their  surroundings  and 
observed,  noticed.  Notes  were  made  during  their  recital.  As 
King  Edward  of  England  had  recently  died,  they  asked  details 
upon  this  event,  in  order  to  discover  if  the  children  read  the 
paper  or  if  they  listened  to  what  others  might  have  read  to  them. 
These  again  are  too  special  questions,  which  make  all  comparison 
impossible;  besides  they  were  badly  put,  certain  children  who 
were  judged  intelligent  in  advance  were  aided  too  much.  I 
noted,  apropos  of  this,  a  surprising  fact;  to  one  of  these  questions, 
two  children  gave  identical  replies;  nevertheless,  one  received 
a  better  mark  than  the  other,  simply  because  the  teacher  had  the 
idea — ^he  admitted  it  to  me — ^that  this  pupil  was  brighter  than 
the  other.  Lastly,  like  every  good  examination,  this  one  termi- 
nated in  scholastic  exercises;  there  were  questions  of  history,  of 
literature,  recitations  of  fables,  and  problems  of  the  metric 
system,  after  assuring  themselves  that  the  children  knew  its 
elements;  and  for  this  too,  explanations  were  given  when  the 
children  did  not  know,  and  one  wished  to  discover  the  rapidity 
with  which  they  could  comprehend.  I  have  no  need  to  say  how 
much  I  disapprove  of  this  mixture,  of  indefinite  proportions,  of 
questions  of  instruction  and  questions  of  intelligence;  it  is  the 
means  of  establishing  nothing  at  all,  neither  the  degree  of  instruc- 
tion nor  the  degree  of  intelligence.  In  conclusion,  I  will  remark 
that  our  three  examiners  were  not  altogether  agreed  in  the  classi- 
fication of  the  children  from  the  intellectual  point  of  view;  but 
that  is  of  no  importance. 

I  asked  them  at  the  end,  how  they  had  proceeded  in  order  to 
evaluate  the  replies;  because  they  had  surely  been  obliged  to 
rate  them  since  they  had  all  given  marks  to  the  candidates.  One  of 
them  frankly  told  me  that  he  had  taken  the  first  child  as  the  point 
of  departure,  and  it  was  to  him  that  he  had  compared  the  others, 
judging  them  intelligent  or  not  according  as  they  were  above  or 
below  their  little  comrade.     Think  of  the  inconvenience  of  such 


314  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

a  practice,  which  leaves  so  much  place  to  what  is  arbitrary,  to 
sympathy,  or  antipathy.  The  first  pupil  suffered  greatly  from 
it  because  he  was  not  judged  comparatively  with  the  others, 
and  he  was  the  recipient  of  an  excessive  and  unreasonable 
severity.  Another  teacher  provided  himself  with  a  more  ingeni- 
ous method;  he  imagined  as  model,  a  child  of  the  same  age  as 
those  who  were  brought  to  him,  a  child  who  seemed  to  him  of 
average  intelligence;  and  it  was  with  this  ideal  model  that  he 
compared  the  successive  candidates.  It  is  a  method  that  re- 
quires a  great  familiarity  with  children,  and  much  intelligence; 
and  I  do  not  hesitate  to  pronounce  it  wrong.  When  one  can  say, 
"The  method  depends  upon  the  man  who  uses  it,"  one  is  not 
praising  the  method.  The  best  is  the  one  that  requires  the  mini- 
mum of  dexterity  and  of  knowledge.  And  then,  does  one  not 
realize  that  these  comparisons  with  an  ideal  average,  are  perilous? 
In  reality  one  has  not  made  previous  experiments,  one  has  not 
put  to  this  average  being  the  same  questions,  one  does  not  know 
exactly  how  he  would  reply,  one  only  makes  conjectures;  and  the 
most  expert' may  be  mistaken. 

Thus,  our  three  teachers,  whom  we  were  designing  enough 
to  put  for  a  moment  in  our  place  and  whom  we  had  charged  to 
make  only  once  that  measure  of  the  intellectual  level  that  we 
take  nearly  every  day,  had  been  lead  almost  naturally  to  employ 
the  same  method  as  ours,  the  method  of  tests;  and  they  were 
forced  to  it,  because  under  the  conditions  in  which  they  operated, 
there  is  no  other.  I  remember  an  alienist,  a  doctor,  who  bitterly 
criticised  our  method  for  the  examination  of  subnormal  children; 
very  well,  let  us  see  how  this  severe  critic  handles  the  matter, 
and  what  methods  he  employs;  he  says  simply  that  he  prefers 
to  show  them  postal  cards  and  make  them  talk  about  them.  But 
what  is  this  exercise,  if  it  is  not  a  test?  Our  critic  of  tests  em- 
ploys tests;  only  he  employs  them  badly;  it  is  the  only  credit 
that  can  be  given  him. 

To  sum  up,  our  teachers  had  recourse  instinctively  to  the  method 
which  we  extol.  We  shall  simply  state  without  the  slightest 
intention  in  the  world  of  reproaching  them  with  it — because 
this  is  not  said  in  criticism — that  they  committed  numerous 
errors;  that  their  questions  were  often  of  a  needless  length, 
that  they  were  frequently  put  in  the  dangerous  alternative  form 
just  noted,  that  they  often  supposed  scholastic  knowledge  which 


teachers'  judgment  of  pupils  315 

had  nothing  to  do  with  the  question,  that  they  were  of  a  nature 
too  special  (they  could  only  have  been  given  that  particular  day, 
or  to  the  children  of  that  school),  that  they  were  put  in  terms 
that  differed  from  pupil  to  pupil  according  to  the  chance  of  the 
conversation;  when  a  child  rephed  badly  or  incompletely,  some- 
thing which  often  happens  with  young  children,  they  whispered 
to  him  without  taking  exact  account  of  that  aid;  and  the  definite 
reply  was  not  judged  in  the  same  manner  for  all  even  when  given 
in  identical  terms.  One  can  see  that  our  teachers  practiced  very 
badly,  a  very  good  method. 

And  this  example  demonstrates  the  exactitude  of  an  excellent 
remark  (un  bien  joli  mot)  which  was  said  to  me  by  an  English 
lady,  a  teacher  who  had  wished  to  know  the  method  used  in  my 
laboratory  for  the  study  of  children.  "Science''  she  said  to  me, 
*' invents  no  more  than  practice;  but  science  does  better.  {Sd- 
ence  nHnvente  rien  de  plus  que  pratique;  mais  science  fait  mieu.) " 
It  is  the  exact  truth,  at  least  in  what  concerns  psychology  and 
pedagogy. 

There  are  sciences  which  invent;  chemistry  for  example  has 
recipes  of  which  one  has  no  idea  in  ordinary  life;  but  the  moral 
sciences  do  not  invent,  properly  speaking,  they  only  bring  to  a 
point  and  perfect  empirical  means;  and  this  is  why  they  give  to 
those  curious  enough  to  initiate  themselves,  a  first  impression  of 
triviality.  When  one  speaks  to  another  about  measuring  the 
intelligence  of  a  child,  he  thinks  that  one  is  going  to  disclose  to 
him  some  surprising  and  mysterious  method;  and  when  one  says 
that  this  method  is  going  to  consist  in  putting  before  him  little 
problems,  which  vaguely  resemble  social  games,  he  will  likely 
exclaim  with  an  undisguised  disappointment,  "Is  that  all!" 
Evidently  he  could  do  the  same,  anybody  could  do  the  same.  But 
"Science  fait  mieux." 

Must  we  conclude  from  this  that  a  teacher  must  always  have 
recourse  to  our  method  in  order  to  obtain  a  knowledge  of  the 
intelhgence  of  his  pupils?  This  would  be  a  great  exaggeration. 
Let  us  not  increase  indiscreetly  the  work  of  teachers  who  have 
from  60  to  80  pupils  in  the  class.  Our  method,  which  is  slow, 
particular,  and  which  requires  some  training,  is  an  exceptional 
one,  a  de  luxe  method.  The  vernier  is  also  an  instrument  de  luxe; 
one  does  not  employ  it  unless  one  wishes  to  measure  to  the  tenth 
of  a  millimeter;  it  is  not  to  be  used  for  ordinary  purposes.     The 


316  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

microscope  is  also  an  instrument  de  luxe;  one  does  not  employ- 
it  to  analyse  the  fabric  of  the  costume  one  buys.  These  instru- 
ments are  only  employed  when  there  is  a  real  interest  in  a  careful 
study.    And  the  same  is  true  for  taking  the  intellectual  level. 

What  Difference  Exists  in  the  Intelligence  of  Children 
Belonging  to  Different  Social  Conditions? 

M.  Decroly  and  Mile.  Degand  have  pubHshed  in  the  Archives 
de  Psychologies  a  study  upon  our  method.  They  applied  it  to 
43  children  (boys  and  girls)  of  a  private  school  which  they  conduct 
at  Brussels,  and  they  were  careful  to  publish  very  detailed  results 
of  their  experiment.  In  reading  their  work,  in  scrutinizing  their 
tables,  and  weighing  their  conclusions,  we  have  been  somewhat 
undecided;  we  have  asked  ourselves  if  it  were  a  confirmation,  or  a 
criticism  of  our  investigation.  Without  doubt  there  was  some 
wavering  in  the  thought  of  the  authors;  and  that  is  easily  under- 
stood ;  the  method  is  delicate,  the  facts  which  they  have  collected 
are  so  varied  and  so  numerous,  that  there  results  in  the  mind  a 
sort  of  obstruction;  one  cannot  clearly  see  the  conclusions  to  be 
drawn  therefrom.  Apropos  of  this,  a  very  significant  fact  has 
been  produced;  authors  who  have  analysed  a  little  severely  the 
work  of  Decroly  and  Degand,  have  thought  they  must  present  it  as 
unfavorable  to  our  investigations;  they  say  the  tests  are  too  easy, 
they  do  not  exactly  apply  to  the  ages  for  which  Binet  and  Simon 
organized  them;  on  the  other  hand,  some  of  the  tests  are  defective 
because  they  involve  too  much  instruction,  and  not  enough  of  the 
natural  intelhgence.  A  superficial  mind,  in  holding  to  this 
analysis,  might  think  that  the  two  Belgian  savants  had  made  a 
complete  refutation  of  the  whole  of  our  method.  Granted  that 
Decroly  and  Degand  have  made  a  great  effort,  granted  that  their 
whole  study  breathes  honesty  and  good  faith,  conscientiousness 
and  care,  still  we  have  thought  that  it  would  be  regrettable  to 
leave  the  matter  there.  We  have  asked  them  for  their  tables 
and  their  notes;  and  we  have  submitted  these  documents  to  an 
analysis  which  we  here  sum  up.  In  this  manner  we  have  been 
able  to  account  for  the  very  interesting  corrections  and  additions 
which  the  Belgian  study  has  contributed  to  our  work. 

«  January,  1910,  No.  34,  Vol.  IX,  p.  81-108. 


EFFECT  OF   SOCIAL   CONDITIONS  317 

One  fact  has  struck  us  forcibly;  it  is  that  the  children  studied 
by  Decroly  and  Degand  give  very  much  better  replies  to  the 
tests  than  our  subjects.  In  calculating  their  level  of  intelligence, 
according  to  the  method  which  we  have  before  indicated,  we  do 
not  find  one  who  is  backward,  not  one,  and  this  is  a  very  sig- 
nificant fact,  because  our  subjects  present  an  equal  amount  of 
advance  and  backwardness.  The  only  little  Belgian  who  would 
present  a  very  slight  degree  of  backwardness  is  a  child  of  twelve 
years,  eight  months,  who  has  a  level  of  twelve  years;  this  is  very 
little.  The  amount  of  the  advance  is  on  the  other  hand  quite 
marked;  there  are  twelve  children  who  are  advanced  more  than 
a  year,  their  advance  being  equal  to  two  years  or  less;  there  are 
eleven  children  who  are  advanced  more  than  two  years;  the  great- 
est advance  is  two  years  and  a  half.  The  average  is  a  year  and  a 
half. 

This  is  a  considerable  difference.  To  what  can  it  be  ascribed? 
To  three  possible  causes — outside  material  errors,  which  truly 
we  could  not  suspect.  First.  The  Belgian  authors  may  have 
made  their  estimates  with  an  excessive  indulgence;  without  being 
conscious  of  it,  they  may  have  aided  their  subjects,  diminishing 
the  difficulty  of  the  questions.  We  regret  that  M.  Decroly  and 
Mile.  Degand  have  not  been  able  to  come  to  Paris,  and  see  us 
operate;  they  know  our  technique  only  through  reading;  they  are 
not,  strictly  speaking,  our  pupils.  In  reading  their  work,  we 
have  had  the  feeling  that  they  really  are  more  indulgent  than  we. 
But  the  difference  has  seemed  to  us  very  slight,  quite  insignificant; 
in  our  opinion  it  could  not  create  among  the  children  an  advance 
of  a  year  and  a  half.  Second.  The  children  studied  are  not  of 
the  same  social  condition  as  ours.  Our  subjects  belong  to  the 
primary  schools  of  Paris  situated  in  the  10th  ward  (rue  Grange- 
aux-Belles,  rue  R^collets,  rue  ficluses  Saint-Martin)  the  district 
is  poor  without  being  indigent.  It  is  to  be  supposed  that  the 
school  conducted  by  M.  Decroly  and  Mile.  Degand  is  differently 
recruited.  At  our  request,  M.  Decroly  and  Mile.  Degand  informed 
us  that  their  pupils  belong  to  a  social  class  in  easy  circumstances; 
they  have  parents  who  are  particularly  gifted  and  understand 
education  in  a  broad  sense;  they  are  renowned  physicians,  uni- 
versity professors,  well  known  lawyers,  etc.  They  also  wrote  us, 
"We  know  perfectly  well  the  mentality  of  our  pupils,  since  there 
are  only  8  or  9  or  10  at  most  in  each  class;  we  see  them  a  great 


318  DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 

deal  between  whiles,  they  are  free,  joyous,  open,  their  counte- 
nances cannot  deceive  us,  we  can  therefore  know  them  well!'' 
To  sum  up,  here  are  two  causes  which,  it  seems  to  us,  explain  the 
difference  of  results,  a  superior  social  condition,  and  an  edu- 
cation which  tends  toward  individualism  (and  which  is  directed 
to  a  small  number  at  a  time).  Already  M.  Rouma  has  told  us 
that  he  had  applied  the  method  to  children  of  the  upper  classes 
in  Belgium,  and  he  had  been  surprised  to  find  how  far  the  children 
were  advanced,  compared  to  children  of  the  primary  school. 
Is  this  a  matter  of  heredity?  Is  it  a  matter  of  education?  It 
would  be  diflicult  to  establish  a  difference  between  the  two 
factors  which  are  here  operating  in  conjunction.  On  the  other 
hand  individual  education  has  superior  advantages;  a  professor 
succeeds  better  in  developing  the  intelligence  of  his  pupils  when 
he  has  only  8  or  10  than  when  he  has  60;  when  he  has  60  he 
cannot  even  know  them  all.  What  occurs  in  our  subnormal 
classes  proves  this  clearly,  and  we  believe  that  the  principal 
advantage  of  these  classes  lies  in  the  very  simple  fact  that  there 
are  fewer  pupils  there  than  in  the  ordinary  classes.  Thus  is 
definitely  explained  the  disagreement  which  seems  to  exist  be- 
tween the  work  of  M.  Decroly  and  Mile.  Degand  and  our  own. 

I  feel  that  M.  Decroly  and  Mile.  Degand  have  had  the  privilege 
of  studying  a  very  interesting  question,  the  difference  of  intelli- 
gence between  the  children  of  the  poorer  classes  and  those  of  the 
rich.  This  I  have  already  written  them.  That  this  difference 
exists  one  might  suspect;  because  our  personal  investigations,  as 
well  as  those  of  many  others,  have  demonstrated  that  children 
of  the  poorer  class  are  shorter,  weigh  less,  have  smaller  heads  and 
slighter  muscular  force,  than  a  child  of  the  upper  class ;  they  less 
often  reach  the  high  school;  they  are  more  often  behind  in  their 
studies.  Here  is  a  collection  of  inferiorities  which  are  slight, 
because  they  are  only  appreciated  when  large  numbers  are  con- 
sidered, but  they  are  undeniable.  Some  probably  are  acquired 
and  result  from  unavoidable  and  accessory  circumstances;  others 
are  probably  congenital.  The  investigations  of  Decroly  and 
Degand  naturally  belong  to  this  group,  they  confirm  what  we 
already  knew;  and  in  a  subject  so  new  as  this,  a  confirmation 
is  not  useless.  In  addition,  there  is  here  something  more,  there 
is  a  measure  of  this  difference. 


EFFECT   OF   SOCIAL   CONDITIONS 


319 


A  second  remark  should  be  made  upon  the  documents  sent  us  by 
Decroly  and  Degand;  for  their  pupils  who  are  a  year  and  a  half 
in  advance  of  those  of  the  primary  schools  of  Paris,  there  is  a 
whole  series  of  tests  in  which  the  advance  is  more  marked  than 
in  the  others;  and  consequently  it  is  perhaps  possible  to  deduce 
something  interesting  upon  which  aptitudes  are  most  favored 
in  the  education  of  a  rich  child.  A  priori  one  would  suppose 
that  these  children,  little  used  to  serving  themselves,  constantly 
surrounded  by  willing  servants,  would  be  more  awkward  with 
their  hands  than  future  workmen.  But  without  making  sup- 
positions let  us  see  what  the  facts  reveal,  or  rather  let  us  see  how 
we  can  draw  some  conclusion  from  the  tables  which  have  been 
submitted  to  us. 

With  those  children  having  an  average  advance  of  a  year  and  a 
half,  we  have  noted  the  tests  for  which  they  have  on  an  average 
an  advance  of  more  than  a  year  and  a  half,  and  tests  for  which 
they  have  on  an  average  an  advance  of  less  than  a  year  and  a  half. 
They  show  no  special  weakness  for  any  test  and  are  not  specially 
backward  for  any  aptitude;  but  their  advance  is  very  unequal. 
Here  is  the  list  of  tests  for  which  their  advance  is  particularly 
strong. 


TESTS  FOR   VHICH    THE    PUPILS    OF    DECROLT 
AND    DEGAND   HAVE  AN   ADVANCE  OF  MORE 
THAN   A   YEAR  AND   A   HALF 

APTITUDES      WHICH     ARE     PROBABLT     CORRE- 
LATED  WITH   THESE   TESTS 

Description  of  pictures 
Interpretation  of  pictures 

Intelligence  and  language 

Count  13  sous. 

Home  training. 

Repeat  5  figures. 

Attention. 

Name  4  colors. 

Home  training. 

Comparisons  from  memory. 

Faculty  of   language  and  observa- 

tion. 

Lack  in  pictures. 

Habit  of  looking  at  pictures,   and 

language. 

Arrangement  of  weights. 

Attention. 

Naming  the  days  of  the  week. 

Home  training. 

Abstract  definitions. 

Language. 

Knowledge  of  pieces  of  money. 

Practical  life. 

Naming  the  months. 

Home  training. 

Finding  60  words. 

Language. 

Criticize  sentences. 

Comprehension  and  language. 

Repeat  long  sentence. 

Attention. 

320  DEVELOPMENT   OF    INTELLIGENCE 

Opposite  each  test  we  have  placed  the  aptitude  which  it 
seems  to  require.  But  we  are  far  from  presenting  our  inter- 
pretation as  final;  it  is  only  assumed.  It  has  seemed  to  us  that, 
when  one  makes  experiments  upon  minds  as  young  as  these,  one 
is  especially  struck  by  the  difficulty  which  the  child  experiences  in 
handling  the  language,  and  in  expressing  in  words  what  he  thinks. 
For  example,  in  the  test  of  criticising  certain  sentences,  the 
children  often  show  that  they  have  understood  the  absurdity  of 
the  sentence  only  by  the  play  of  the  countenance,  the  intonation 
of  the  voice,  or  by  the  simple  fact  that  they  repeat  the  sentence. 
Thus  when  asked,  ''Yesterday  there  was  an  accident  on  the  rail- 
road, but  it  was  not  serious,  the  number  of  deaths  was  only  48," 
they  say  simply,  "The  number  of  deaths  was  only  48  and  it  was 
not  serious!"  There  is  in  this  manner  of  expression,  or  rather 
of  non-expression,  a  simplicity  which  recalls  primitive  poetry 
where  the  facts  are  announced  but  not  judged.  Consequently 
we  have  felt  justified  in  supposing  that  language  played  a  part  in 
a  good  many  of  the  tests  contained  in  the  above  list.  It  is  the 
same  with  the  60  words,  the  abstract  definitions,  and  the  criticism 
of  sentences.  Many  others  seem  to  us  to  depend  upon  home 
training.  It  is  not  in  school  that  the  children  are  taught  the 
days  of  the  week,  the  months,  or  colors;  it  is  at  home,  or  at  least, 
it  seems  so  to  us.  Taking  all  into  account  it  would  seem  that 
these  little  rich  children  are  advanced  for:  Attention,  in  3  tests; 
Home  training,  in  4  tests;  Language,  in  6  tests. 

This  last  point  seems  the  most  characteristic;  the  little  children 
of  the  upper  classes  understand  better  and  speak  better  the 
language  of  others.  We  have  also  noted  that  when  they  begin 
to  compose,  their  compositions  contain  expressions  and  words 
better  chosen  than  those  of  poor  children.  This  verbal  superi- 
ority must  certainly  come  from  the  family  life;  the  children  of  the 
rich  are  in  a  superior  environment  from  the  point  of  view  of 
language;  they  hear  a  more  correct  language  and  one  that  is  more 
expressive. 

Now  note  the  tests  for  which  the  children  show  an  advance  of 
less  than  a  year  and  a  half. 


EFFECT   OF   SOCIAL   CONDITIONS 


321 


TESTS  FOR  -WHICH    THE    PUPILS    OP   DBCROLY 
AND   DEGAND  ARE    ADVANCED    LESS    THAN 
A   YEAR  AND  A  HALF 

APTITUDES     WHICH     ARE     PROBABLY     COBRK- 
LATED   WITH  THESE  TESTS 

Copy  a  sentence. 

Scholastic  exercise. 

Reading. 

Scholastic  exercise. 

Counting  9  sous. 

Practical  life  or  home  training. 

Counting  backwards. 

Scholastic  exercise. 

Writing  from  dictation. 

Scholastic  exercise. 

Copying  a  diamond. 

Scholastic  exercise. 

Giving  change  from  20  sous. 

Scholastic  exercise. 

Putting  3  words  into  one  sentence 

Language. 

Finding  rhymes. 

Language. 

Problem  of  different  facts. 

Judgment. 

Here  again,  we  make  the  most  emphatic  reservations  upon  the 
aptitudes  which  we  have  felt  to  be  correlated  with  the  different 
tests.  Nevertheless  our  list  shows  that  the  tests  of  language  are 
fewer  than  in  the  first  list;  on  the  other  hand  scholastic  exercises 
abound.  As  Decroly  and  Degand  have  already  remarked,  it  is 
especially  in  the  degree  of  instruction  that  the  children  of  the 
rich  approach  those  of  the  poor.  They  are  not  backward  in 
instruction  but  they  do  nob  show  the  same  marked  advance  that 
they  showed  in  other  tests.  This  may  be  the  result  of  accidental 
circumstances  which  have  no  importance;  for  example,  the  habit 
of  the  parents  of  not  pushing  their  children  and  of  not  sending 
them  to  school  too  early. 

To  sum  up,  the  experiments  of  Decroly  and  Degand  when 
thoroughly  examined  cannot  lead  us  to  change  the  tests;  because 
if  most  of  the  tests  have  seemed  too  easy  for  their  children,  it  is 
due  simply  to  the  fact  that  the  intellectual  level  of  their  children 
is  that  of  the  rich.  On  the  other  hand  the  work  that  the  two  Bel- 
gian savants  have  done  is  interesting  and  has  shown  us  with  equal 
precision  two  new  facts:  First.  That  the  intellectual  superiority 
of  children  of  the  higher  classes  over  that  of  children  of  the  lower 
amounts  to  an  average  advance  of  a  year  and  a  half.  Second. 
The  intellectual  superiority  manifests  itself  especially  in  the  tests 
where  language  plays  a  part. 

I  have  sought  to  find  a  confirmation  of  the  preceding  investiga- 
tions by  making  a  fresh  study  of  documents  gathered  a  long  time 
ago.  Among  the  pupils  of  the  schools  of  the  10th  ward  whose  intelli- 
gence we  measured  three  years  ago,  there  are  those  who  come  from 


322 


DEVELOPMENT   OP   INTELLIGENCE 


indigent  conditions;  there  are  others  who  are  in  easy  circumstances. 
All  this  was  noted  at  the  time  of  the  examination.  But  in  com- 
paring the  average  of  the  intellectual  level  of  children  from 
wretched  surroundings  with  the  average  of  children  in  easy  cir- 
cumstances, I  have  found  no  appreciable  difference.  What 
causes  the  negative  result?  Perhaps  because  the  social  condition 
was  not  noted  with  sufficient  care,  or  perhaps  also  because  the 
difference  of  the  conditions  was  too  slight. 

I  therefore  asked  the  school  director,  M.  Morle,  who  measured 
the  intellectual  level  of  50  children  from  his  own  school,  to  note 
with  great  care  the  social  standing  of  each  of  them;  and  to  give 
in  his  report  of  each  child  one  of  the  four  following  qualifications: 
indigence,  poverty,  mediocrity,  ease,  from  definitions  devised  in  a 
previous  work  with  my  habitual  collaborator,  M.  Vaney.  Strange 
to  say,  the  results  which  have  been  obtained  by  M.  Morle  and 
which  I  calculated  from  the  pages  which  he  sent  me,  are  entirely 
negative.     Here  is  the  exact  statement. 

Intellectual  Level  of  Primary  School  Children  in  Relation  to  their  Social 

Condition 


INTELIECTUAL  LEVEI, 

INDIGENCE 

POVERTY 

MEDIOCRITY 

EASE 

Average 

2 
4 
4 

1 
1 
1 

12 

9 

2 

9 

Inferior 

5 

Superior 

4 

By  attentively  reading  this  table,  one  can  see  that  the  children 
of  an  intelligence  superior  to  the  average  are  just  as  numerous 
in  the  group  of  indigence  as  in  that  of  ease;  and  it  is  the  same  in 
regard  to  children  inferior  to  the  average.  How  shall  we  inter- 
pret these  results?  It  is  clear  that  we  cannot  accuse  the  experi- 
menter of  negligence.  How  does  it  happen  then  that  the  social 
condition,  which  exercises  such  an  influence  over  the  pupils  of 
Mile.  Degand,  is  not  of  the  least  importance  in  a  primary  class 
here  in  Paris?  Perhaps  it  is  because  the  social  differences  among 
children  of  our  primary  school  are  not  distinct  enough  to  produce 
a  difference  of  intellectual  development;  for  even  when  the 
children  come  of  parents  in  easy  circumstances,  they  do  not  see 
their  parents  as  often  as  do  the  children  of  the  rich;  they  are 
left  more  to  themselves;  the  parents  make  a  good  living,  but  they 


EFFECT  OF   SOCIAL   CONDITIONS  323 

live  away  from  home,  enter  late  at  night,  and  do  not  bother  much 
with  the  children;  with  others  the  environment  is  unfavorable 
to  their  education  because  the  parents  are  wine  merchants  or 
alcoholics.  And  it  must  be  added  that  what  equalizes  the  chil- 
dren of  different  social  conditions  in  the  primary  school  is  that  they 
all  receive  the  same  kind  of  instruction  in  class.  To  sum  up, 
there  is  persumably  here  a  question  of  very  slight  social  differ- 
ences which  cannot  exercise  a  noticeable  influence  upon  the  in- 
tellectual level. 

Very  different  have  been  the  results  obtained  by  Madame  The- 
venot,  directress  of  a  primary  school  for  boys,  rue  Cadet.  Mme. 
Thevenot  measured  the  intelligence  of  18  children,  of  whom  15 
were  between  eight  and  nine  yfears  of  age  and  three  were  between 
seven  and  eight.  These  children  belonged  to  her  class  because 
the  school  is  small  and  Madame  Thevenot  teaches  at  the  same 
time  that  she  is  directress.  Mme.  Thevenot  has  worked  with 
M.  Vaney  and  me  and  she  uses  the  measuring  scale  very  well. 
Immediately  one  is  struck  with  the  figures  which  she  obtained. 
Not  one  of  her  pupils  is  behind  in  intelligence,  and  many  are  in 
advance.  Some  are  three  years  ahead,  6  are  two  years  and  over; 
as  an  average  the  advance  is  1.7  (that  is  a  little  more  than  one  year 
and  a  half);  it  is  an  advance  analogous  to  that  of  the  pupils  of 
Mile.  Degand;  it  is  considerable  since  this  is  a  mean  value. 

Mme.  Thevenot  considers  that  these  children  are  of  a  higher 
intelligence  than  those  of  other  schools  where  she  has  taught; 
we  think  that  the  social  condition  of  the  parents  (the  rue 
Cadet  is  located  in  a  commercial  quarter  in  the  center  of  Paris  and 
is  quite  rich)  must  have  an  influence.  It  is  also  worthy  of 
note  that  several  of  these  little  pupils  are  of  foreign  birth.  The 
instruction  is  more  individual  than  in  most  schools  as  Mme. 
Thevenot  has  only  15  pupils  in  her  class.  Ordinarily  classes 
number  from  30  to  40  pupils.  Finally  Mme.  Thevenot  felt  it 
worthy  of  note  that  these  children  were  started  the  preceding 
year  by  a  very  superior  teacher  who  taught  the  preparatory  class. 
Thus  one  sees  many  slight  causes  operating  to  produce  the  results, 
and  it  would  be  rash  to  try  to  explain  each  one  of  them;  good 
social  conditions  and  individuaUzed  education  agree  in  producing 
the  same  result. 

Miss  Katherine  Johnston,  of  the  University  of  Sheffield,  dur- 
ing the  year  1910  came  to  visit  my  laboratory,  rue  Grange-aux- 


324 


DEVELOPMENT   OF  INTELLIGENCE 


Belles;  she  was  especially  interested  in  the  measure  of  the  in- 
tellectual level,  and,  returning  to  England,  repeated  the  experi- 
ments upon  200  school  children  of  Sheffield.  The  results  were 
made  public  by  her,  at  a  meeting  of  the  British  Association  at 
Sheffield  in  1910;  she  courteously  communicated  these  results  to 
me  and  repHed  to  my  questions.  It  appears  from  the  documents 
which  I  have  seen  that  she  worked  with  children  of  very  unequal 
social  standing.  The  schools  which  opened  their  doors  to  her 
presented  very  different  conditions;  here  the  population  repre- 
sented the  hberal  professions,  there  the  trained  mechanics,  again 
the  extremely  poor  mechanics.  It  is  a  pity  that  these  heterogene- 
ous elements  have  been  confused  in  the  averages,  which  thus  lose 
some  of  their  significance.  I  strongly  urge  the  author  to  calculate 
new  averages,  taking  account  of  the  state  of  poverty  or  wealth 
represented  by  the  parents  of  the  children.  A  detail  in  passing. 
I  suppose  that  in  the  rich  schools,  there  are  fewer  children  in  a 
class  than  in  the  poor  schools;  and  that  is,  I  beheve,  an  important 
condition  to  note  in  order  to  correctly  estimate  the  intellectual 
development  of  the  child;  I  beheve  that,  everything  else  being 
equal,  a  child^s  intellect  will  develop  better  in  a  class  composed  of 
15  or  20  pupils,  than  in  a  class  composed  of  a  great  number.  The 
information  furnished  by  Miss  Johnston  confirms  this  idea  to  a 
certain  extent,  because  in  the  schools  of  the  rich,  it. is  said  that  the 
number  does  not  exceed  15  or  20,  while  in  the  schools  of  the  poor 
it  varies  from  40  to  60.     But  this  rule  is  not  without  exception. 

From  the  accounts  of  the  experiments  which  have  appeared  in 
the  journals  I  have  not  understood  the  results  of  Miss  Johnston's 
experiments  because  she  has  sometimes  employed  a  method  of 
calculation  which  is  personal  to  her  and  which  I  consider  open  to 
criticism.  But  in  putting  the  results  in  a  form  which  I  have  myself 
calculated  here  is  the  table  which  one  obtains. 


Distribution  of  Intellectual  Levels  of  the  Pupils  in  Miss  Johnston's  Experi- 
ments at  Sheffield 


AGES  OF  CHILDREN 

6 

years 

7 
years 

8 
years 

9 
years 

10 
years 

11 

years 

Superior  to  the  average 

4 

24 

8 
5 

8 

10 

2 

12 
10 

8 

6 
12 
17 

1 

Average 

2 

Inferior  to  the  average 

17 

EFFECT  OF   SOCIAL  CONDITIONS  325 

It  results  from  the  above  table  (and  this  commentary  will 
explain  it)  that  55  children  are  superior  to  their  level,  42  are  equal 
to  it,  and  49  are  inferior.  If  one  notes  besides,  that  starting  with 
11  years  the  number  of  children  below  the  normal  level  has 
distinctly  increased,  which  results  as  we  have  shown  from  the 
fact  that  the  tests  of  11  and  12  years  were  much  too  severe,  one 
might  conclude  that  Miss  Johnston's  results  were  in  perfect 
accord  with  our  own. 

This  is  the  best  reply  to  certain  objections  which  have  been 
made  to  us.  Objections  have  not  been  lacking;  some  have  been 
just;  but  others  have  been  childish.  In  an  Italian  review  it  was 
declared  that  our  tests  were  too  easy.  The  experiments  of  Decroly 
and  Mile.  Degand  seem  to  have  lent  support  to  this  criticism. 
Whipple,  in  spite  of  the  friendliness  of  his  analysis,  has  associated 
himself  with  these  imreservedly.  Truly,  without  wishing  to 
defend  to  excess  a  method  which  is  only  being  tried,  I  repel  these 
objections;  Miss  Johnston's  results  are  there  to  prove  that  they 
are  not  well  founded. 

I  again  requested  Miss  Johnston  to  indicate  the  tests  that  are 
easiest  for  each  age.  Here  is  an  extract  from  her  communication 
which  shows  not  only  the  tests  that  are  easiest  but  those  which 
are  the  most  difficult. 

41  children  of  7  years 

Failures 

Lack  in  pictures 24 

Naming  4  pieces  of  money 19 

Repeating  5  jSgures 18 

Number  of  fingers 10 

Counting  13  sous 7 

Description  of  pictures 5 

Copying  a  diamond 4 

Copying  a  written  model 2 

^2  children  of  8  years 

Failures 

Counting  backwards 17 

Reading  with  2  memories 16 

Dictation 3 

Naming  of  colors 2 

Comparing  two  objects  from  memory 2 

Counting  3  single  and  3  double  sous 1 


326  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

SO  children  of  9  years 

Failures 

Definitions  superior  to  use 23 

Arranging  weights 21 

Giving  change  from  20  sous 16 

Reading  with  6  memories ,14 

Date 10 

Days  of  the  week 2 

38  children  of  10  years 

Failures 

Difficult  questions 26 

3  words  in  2  sentences 21 

The  9  pieces  of  money 19 

Easy  questions 6 

The  months  of  the  j'^ear 0 

24  children  of  12  years 

Failures 

Abstract  definitions 21 

Putting  words  in  order ^^ 13 

3  words  in  1  sentence 12 

Criticism  of  sentences 7 

More  than  60  words 5 

If  one  compares  these  results  with  those  we  have  indicated  in  our 
Table  II,  it  will  be  found  that  except  for  tests  where  our  little 
Parisians  are  decidedly  in  advance  of  their  neighbors  (lack  in  pic- 
tures, counting  backwards,  abstract  definitions)  the  other  results 
are  almost  analogous. 

Finally,  I  recently  asked  my  devoted  collaborator,  M.  Morl^, 
director  of  a  school  in  Paris,  to  take  the  measure  of  the  level 
in  two  primary  schools  presenting  extreme  social  differences.  It 
seemed  to  me  advisable  to  entrust  the  two  parts  of  the  experi- 
ment to  the  same  experimenter.  M.  MorM  had  already  taken  the 
measure  of  the  level  of  the  children  in  his  school  (rue-Sambre-et- 
Meuse)  which  is  one  of  the  poorest  in  Paris ;  with  these  indications 
and  with  the  authorization  of  the  inspector,  M.  Belot,  he  made  the 
supplementary  investigations  in  the  school,  rue  Marseilles,  where 
the  children  belong  to  a  population  in  easy  circumstances.  M. 
Morl^  took  all  the  necessary  precautions  not  to  let  himself  be 
influenced ;  he  even  voluntarily  ignored  the  school  standing  of  the 
pupils  examined.  His  findings  are  very  significant.  In  compar- 
ing from  the  point  of  view  of  level  30  children  from  the  school  of 
the  poorer  class  with  30  children  of  the  class  in  easy  circumstances, 


EFFECT  OF   SOCIAL   CONDITIONS 


327 


the  age  being  the  same  in  both,  he  found  the  distribution  indicated 
by  the  following  table  : 

Comparison,  from  the  Point  of  View  of  Intellectual  Level,  of  a  Primary  School 
Attended  by  the  Poorer  Class,  with  a  Primary  School  Attended  by  Those  in 
Easy  Circumstances. 


StrPERIOB 

INTELLECTUAL 

LEVEL 

LEVEL 

EQUAL  TO  THE 

AVERAGE 

INFERIOR 

INTELLECTUAL 
LEVEL 

2  years 

1  year 

1  year 

2  years 

Poor  Primary  School  

1 

6 

4 
10 

13 
10 

11 

3 

1 

Primary     School     Easy 
Circumstances 

1 

Thus,  on  one  hand,  there  are  16  students  in  the  better  class  school 
in  advance,  while  in  the  poorer  school  there  are  only  5;  and  on  the 
other  hand  there  are  4  children  in  the  better  class  school  who  are 
backward,  while  there  are  12  backward  children  in  the  poor  school. 
If  from  these  figures  we  try  to  estimate  in  years  the  mean  diver- 
gence which  separates  these  two  groups  of  children,  we  find  that 
it  is  about  three-fourths  of  a  year.  The  total  of  the  poor  children 
is  below  the  average  by  one-fourth  of  a  year  and  the  children  of 
the  better  class  are  above  it  by  a  half  year.  Certainly  this  ad- 
vance of  one-half  year  is  not  equal  to  that  which  Mile.  Degand 
found  under  conditions  much  more  favorable;  it  points,  however, 
in  the  same  direction  and  is  consequently  a  valuable  confirmation. 
Let  us  add,  in  passing,  that  the  school  standing  of  the  children 
in  the  poor  school  was  less  advanced  than  that  of  those  in  the 
better  school  as  the  following  table  indicates : 

Comparison  from  the  Point  of  View  of  Scholastic  Level  in  a  Poor  Primary 
School,  and  in  a  Primary  School  of  the  Better  Class 


SUPERIOR 

SCHOLASTIC 

LEVEL 

AVERAGE 

SCHOLASTIC 

LEVEL 

INFERIOR 

SCHOLASTIC 

LEVEL 

2  years 

1  year 

1  year 

2  years 

Poor  School 

0 
2 

3 
12 

18 

12 

7 
3 

0 

Better  Class  School 

0 

The  difference  shows  itself  also  in  the  same  direction;  the  average 
scholastic  level  in  the  poor  school  is  very  little  removed  from  the 


328  DEVELOPMENT   OF   INTELLIGENCE 

normal  average;  while  that  of  the  better  class  school  is  slightly 
in  advance,  about  a  half  year.  That  need  not  surprise  us  since 
we  have  already  seen  that  the  scholastic  level  and  the  intellectual 
level  go  hand  in  hand. 

^  .,yQ^^-J-Q~-P-QP<^MsiQIL  A  singularly  interfeting  idea  arises 
from  these  investigations  which  I  have  already  noted  in  my 
previous  articles  but  perhaps  without  sufficient  insistence.  For 
the  first  time  I  now  see  its  full  meaning.  This  idea  may  present 
itself  first  as  a  criticism  of  past  methods.  For  a  long  while  the 
psychologists  have  tried  to  establish  correlations  of  experiments; 
they  study  among  adults  and  more  often  among  children  some 
aptitudes  which  seem  to  them  different  and  afterwards  they  wish 
to  know  what  bearing  they  have  upon  one  another.  Legitimate 
investigation  certainly  and  timely;  but  more  often  they  can  lead 
to  no  real  result,  so  that  the  calculations  of  correlations  has 
become  one  of  the  most  delicate  questions  of  psychology. 

We  now  understand  why.  It  is  because  the  aptitudes  studied 
have  not  been  the  object  of  a  sufficiently  profound  investigation. 
One  has  contented  himself  with  an  experiment  or  two.  Thus,  to 
take  a  simple  example  upon  which  we  can  reason,  one  has  studied 
by  short  and  rapid  tests  suggestibility  by  lines  then  by  weights; 
afterwards  one  tries  to  find  if  a  child,  suggestible  to  one  form  of 
test  is  also  suggestible  to  the  others;  and  naturally  one  never  finds 
appreciable  correlation.  An  American  investigation  published 
this  year  arrives  at  this  conclusion.  But  what  we  should  do 
first  and  above  all  else  during  this  period  of  groping  in  which  we 
now  are,  is  not  to  make  a  comparison  of  tests,  an  anal5d:ical 
investigation  of  their  correlations,  but  just  the  contrary,  that  is  to 
say,  a  comprehensive  study  of  their  significance,  a  calculation  of 
their  results.  Just  as  it  is  perilous  to  investigate  whether  one 
form  of  suggestibility  is  correlated  with  another,  so  on  the  other 
hand  is  it  advantageous  to  try  to  group  all  the  tests  of  suggesti- 
bility, to  make  of  them  a  mass,  and  to  make  a  classification  of 
pupils  from  this  point  of  view,  to  afterwards  see  if  the  most  sug- 
gestible pupils  are  the  youngest,  more  docile  in  the  class,  or  have 
such  and  such  mental  qualities  more  pronounced  than  less  sug- 
gestible pupils.  This  is  what  we  have  tried  for  the  measure  of 
intelligence;  we  have  grouped  all  the  tests  supposing  that  they 
all  more  or  less  tend  in  the  same  direction  and  we  have  thus 
arrived  at  a  classification  of  pupils  from  the  point  of  view  of  the 
intelligence. 


CONCLUSION  329 

What  is  the  reason  for  proceeding  thus?  Obviously  it  rests 
upon  the  principle  that  a  particular  test  isolated  from  the  rest 
is  of  little  value,  that  it  is  open  to  errors  of  every  sort,  especially 
if  it  is  rapid  and  is  applied  to  school  children;  that  which  gives  a 
demonstrative  force  is  a  group  of  tests,  a  collection  which  pre- 
serves the  average  physiognomy.  This  may  seem  to  be  a  truth 
so  trivial  as  to  be  scarcely  worth  the  trouble  of  expressing  it. 
On  the  contrary  it  is  a  profound  truth,  and  good  sense  is  so  far 
from  being  sufficient  to  divine  this  so  called  triviality,  that  up  to 
the  present  it  has  been  constantly  disregarded.  One  test  signi- 
fies nothing,  let  us  emphatically  repeat,  but  five  or  six  tests  signify 
something.  And  that  is  so  true  that  one  might  almost  say, 
"It  matters  very  little  what  the  tests  are  so  long  as  they  are 
numerous. '' 

In  support  of  this,  I  shall  cite  what  Mile.  Giroud^  recently 
proved  in  applying  to  pupils  a  method  of  measuring  the  intelli- 
gence devised  by  our  colleague  M.  Ferrari.  This  method  is 
composed,  very  much  like  that  of  Blin,  of  a  long  series  of  questions 
which  one  puts  to  the  subjects;  the  questions  are  often  badly 
formed  and  Mile.  Giroud  has  made  a  detailed  criticism  which 
shows  that  out  of  some  forty  of  them  scarcely  more  than  8  or  10 
can  be  retained;  furthermore,  I  hasten  to  add  that  this  criticism 
can  in  no  way  touch  the  author  of  this  list  of  questions  because 
they  were  not  organized  for  the  study  of  children  but  for  the 
study  of  patients.  But  in  spite  of  the  immense  majority  of  the 
questions  being  poorly  made  for  children,  the  total  result  is  far 
from  being  bad;  one  succeeds  in  proving  that  the  total  number  of 
questions  to  which  good  repUes  are  given  grows  quite  regularly 
with  the  age,  which  is  the  touch  stone  of  the  test.  It  is  necessary 
that  the  principle  of  the  methods  which  we  employ  be  excellent 
in  order  that  they  can  lead  to  such  useful  conclusions  even  when 
they  are  badly  appHed.  It  is  then  chiefly  to  the  principle  of  the 
multiplicity  of  tests  that  the  attention  of  the  psychologists  must 
be  drawn.  Without  doubt  great  benefit  will  be  derived  from 
these  methods  in  the  future  for  the  study  of  aptitudes  of  character 
and  even  for  the  psychological  condition,  in  a  word  for  the  realiza- 
tion of  a  measure  of  individual  psychology. 

Alfred  Binet. 

'  Mile.  Giroud.  Study  for  a  New  Process  for  Measuring  the  Intellectual 
Level.   Soc.  libre  pour  I'^tude  psychologique  de  Tenfant,  No.  69,  Mars,  1911. 


INDEX 


Abstract    differences,    idleness 

and  laziness,  etc 286 

question 65,  121 

terms,  definitions  of 68,  230 

Absurdities 227 

Adenoidal  condition 84 

Adults,  application  of  scale  to 

defective 267 

Age,  how  old  are  you? 206 

of  parents  at  the  birth  of  the 

child 77 

Alcoholism  of  the  parents 77 

Algeria 41 

Anatomical  examination 80 

Anthropology 92 

Aptitudes 121 

Arithmetic 305 

Attention,  the  key  to  idiocy. . .  26 

a  test  of 255 

Attitude   to   be   taken  toward 

the  child 295 

Automatic  tendency 202 

Automatism 115 

Autopsies 268 

Backward  adult,  the 266 

child,  the 266 

Backwardness,       how       much 

means  defective 269 

Bicetre 11 

Bicycle,  know  how  to  ride  a 74 

Blin,  Dr 10 

Blood,  examination  of 86 

Boundary    of    imbecility    and 

moronity 103 

Bourneville. 11,  144 

Bourneville's  classification.  19,     20 

Brain,  study  of  the 269 

Bridgman,  Laura 43 

Brothers,  three 228 


Cases,  examined  by  Binet 240 

illustrating  method  of  scoring  245 

Certificates,  dissimilar 11 

Chance,  error  of,  eliminated. . .  115 

Change,  making 218 

Charity  defined 230 

Child,  superiority  of  a,  over  an 

adult 115 

Children,  kind  of,  examined 92 

number  of,  necessary  to  ex- 
amine   169 

silent 185 

of  three  years 93,  184 

of  four  years 195 

of  five  years 96,  196 

of  six  years 201 

of  seven  years 98,  207 

of  eight  years 211 

of  nine  years 217 

of  ten  years 224 

of  eleven  years 227 

of  twelve  years 232 

of  thirteen  years 234 

of  fifteen  years 276 

Classification,  Bourneville's 19 

Ireland's 18 

SoUier's 25 

Voisin's 20 

character  of 23 

to  be  made  by  means  of  psy- 
chology      22 

of  the  tests  according  to  age .  237 

Classifications,  criticism  of 23 

Clock,  reversal  of  the  hands  of    66 

Coins,  naming  four 211 

Colors,  naming  four 215 

Commands,  execution  of 48 

Commissions,       execution      of 
three 205 


331 


332 


INDEX 


Comparison 

of  lengths 52,  61,  112,  196 

of  objects  from  memory...  59,  216 

of  two  weights 55,  196 

procedure  for 99 

Comparisons,  reasoned 102 

Comprehension  questions 224 

Consanguinity  of  the  parents ...     77 

Copy  of  a  written  model 209 

Copying  a  diamond 209 

a  square 198 

Corrections    proposed    to    the 

scale 275 

Correlations,  calculations  of 328 

Correspondance  d' omnibus 73 

Count,  from  20  to  0 215 

Counting  four  single  sous 200 

nine  sous 214 

thirteen  sous 210 

Cranium,  malformation  of  the.     84 
Criminality  and  intelligence. . .  272 

Criticism  of  classifications 23 

of  sentences 227 

Cyclipt,  an  unfortunate 228 

Damaye 11,  28 

Data,  character  of 92 

interpret  the 123 

source  of 184 

Date,  give  the 217 

Days  of  the  week 218 

Ddbile 10,  161 

Decroly,  M 316 

Defective  nutrition , 84 

Definitions,  abstract. 230 

of  abstract  terms 68 

Definition  of  backward  children 
not  uniform 11 

of  familiar  objects 57,  202 

Definition  by  use  only 204 

superior  to  use 205,  219 

characterized  by  Binet 23 

Degand,  Mile 316 

Degrees  of  intellectual  inferi- 
ority    145 

De  moor,  Dr 70 

on  physiognomy  of  defectives    87 
Demoor  illusion 55 


Dentition,  retardation  of 79 

Design  from  memory,  copy 

a 60,  282 

Development  (Ley's  diagnosis).     79 

Diagnosis,  diflSculties  of 264 

inexact 12 

three  methods 90 

Diamond,  copying  a 209 

Dictation,  writing  from 216 

Differences,    paper    and   card- 
board      99 

pleasure  and  happiness,  etc. 

68,  235 

Diflficulty,  tests  in  order  of 250 

Distribution   of   cases    by   the 

scale 252 

Drawing  a  design 60 

Dreyfus 170 

Ears 84 

Ebbinghaus  test 64 

Eight  year  old  children 211 

Eighteen  pieces,  cut  into 228 

Eleven  year  old  children 227 

Encourage  always 122,  236 

Esquirol 15 

Esthetic  comparison 202 

Estimate  of  results 239 

Examination,     general     condi- 
tions of  the 236 

indispensable  condition 170 

our  methods  of 142 

for  scholarship 35 

of  subnormal  children 168 

time  required  for 41 

Experiments 311 

of  Decroly  and  Degand 321 

Experimenter,  preparation  of. .  237 

qualifications  of 44 

Expression 307 

Facts,  problem  of  various 233 

Figures,  memory  for 110 

procedure 53 

rate  of  pronouncing 188 

repetition  of  three 53 

Fingers,  number  of 209 

Five  figures,  repetition  of 210 


INDEX 


333 


Five  years,  children  of 196 

Fontainebleau,  walking  in  the 

forest 233 

Food,  quest  of 48 

recognition  of 47 

Four  years,  children  of 195 

Fractions  of  year  not  highly  sig- 
nificant   278 

Frying  an  egg 73 

Genius 68 

Gestures,  imitation  of  simple . .     48 

Gilbert,  Allen 92 

Giroud,  Mile 329 

Goodness,  definition  of 231 

Grammatical  point  of  view 205 

Hair 84 

Head  measurements 82 

Height 80 

Help,  one  child  may  give  to  an- 
other   223 

Hereditary  influences 77 

Historical  notes 15 

History  as  test  of  intelligence  306 
Hostility    to    investigation    of 

subnormals 168 

Houses,  three  burn 212 

Idiocy,  defined  by  Esquirol 16 

Idiot 10,  145 

once  an, — always 144 

precise  definition 266 

Idiots,  certain  faculties  almost 

wanting 38 

classified 146 

Illusion,    Demoor  size — ^weight    55 

Illustrative  case — Ernest 180 

Martin 171 

Raynaud 178 

Imbecile 10,  145 

precise  definition 266 

today,  may  become  a  moron.  270 

Imbeciles  classified 152 

Institution  cases 139 

Instruction,  intelligence  and...     42 
tests  of 217 


Intellectual    faculty,    indepen-         *^ 
dent  of  instruction 254   / 

Intellectual  level,  diagnosis  of . .     39  "* 
relation  to  age  of  the  subject.  143 
relations  between  the,  and  the 

scholastic  standing 288 

in  relation  to  social  condition  322 

of  subnormals 37       / 

Intelligence  defined 42  — 

general 39  ^   ^ 

measure  of  the 40      ^ 

normal  development  of  the . .     91   , 

of  a  child 91  " 

apropos  of  the  definition  of. . .  253    ^ 
the  development  of,   in  the 

child 182  ^ 

how  do  teachers  judge 297 

measured  by  a  synthesis  of  re-         /, 

suits 268'''^ 

most  direct  means  for  judging  308  '*^ 
of  what  use  is  a  measure  of . . .  263  ^  "^ 
and  scholastic  aptitude,  dis- 

tinction  between 253  ^ 

sensorial 220 

two  kinds  of 259  '-^ 

Interpretation,  replies  by 193 

Investigators,  relation    of,    to 
school  oflacers 169 

Ireland,  classification  of 18 

Irregularities,  in  passing  tests.  282 

Johnston,  Miss  Katherine 323 

Judgment 41,  43,  107 

defined 42 

Justice  defined 230 

Keller,  Helen 43 

Knowledge  not  a  measure  of  in- 
telligence   304 

Language,  intelligence  with  de- 
velopment of 121 

Level,  the  intellectual,  and  the 

judgment 223 

Levels,  intellectual 92 

Ley,  Dr 77 

Ley's  diagnosis 84 

Life  is  neither  good  nor  bad. . .  287 


334 


INDEX 


Manual  work 305 

Maternal  school 98 

Measuring  scale  of  intelligence 

40,  184 

general  recommendations 44 

the  use  of 261 

Medical  method 40,  75,  90 

Memory 43,  104 

of  pictures 60 

simulator  of  intelligence 304 

Mental  age  of  idiots,  imbeciles 

and  morons 270 

level 40 

tests  for  recruits 272 

Method,  depends  upon  the  man  314 
Money,  naming  the  nine  pieces  of  221 

Months  of  the  year 221 

Moral  imbeciles 37 

Morel,  terminology  of 14 

Morning    and    afternoon,    dis- 
tinction between 206 

Moron 10,  145 

precise  definition 266 

Morons  classified 161 

Moronity 41 

Mortality  of  brothers  and  sis- 
ters   79 

^-Motor  functions 85 

Mutism 122 

Name,  family 194 

Naming  of,  designated  objects.     51 

familiar  objects 195 

Nantes,  edict  of 306 

Napoleon  1 306 

Necessity  of  a  standard 89 

Neighbor's  visitors 233 

Neuropathic  affections 77 

Nine  year  old  children 217 

Nitchevo 57 

Nomenclature,  faults  of 13 

Normal  child,  discussion 264 

Notes,  to  be  made 296 

utilization  of 242 

Objects,  naming  of  designated.     51 
verbal  knowledge  of 49 


Observation  of  Ernest 180 

of  Martin 171 

of  Raynaud 178 

Observers   (visitors)  at  an  ex- 
amination  236 

Order  of  the  child  in  the  family    78 

Orthography 307 

Palate,  high,  narrow 84 

Paper  cutting 67,  120,  234 

Parents,  attitude  of 39 

Patapoum 57 

Pathological  history 79 

Patience,  game  of 198 

Peasant,    normal    in    ordinary 

surroundings 266 

Pedagogy,  of  interest  for 101 

Pedagogical,  method....  40,  70,  90 

retardation 70,  254 

Penal  responsibility 272 

Physiogomy 301 

expression  of 86 

reveals  intelligence 88 

Physiological  examination 85 

Picture,  description  of  a 210 

presentation  of  a 188 

Pictures,  the  three 189 

memory  for  13 109 

unfinished 207 

verbal  knowledge  of 50 

Pinel 15 

Play,  observe  children  during  303 
Pointing    to    nose,    eyes    and 

mouth 184 

Poland,  partition  of 306 

Praise,  value  of 141 

Precocity  of  children 79 

Preconceived  idea 170 

Prehension 46 

President,  question  of 287 

Price  of  a  sack  of  charcoal 73 

Primary  schools,  subnormals  of 

the 167 

/Procedure 141 

•'Procedure,  general 93,  122—123 

Psychology  in  institutions 144 


INDEX 


335 


Psychological,  classifications...     24 

examination 91 

method 40,  90 

rapidity  of,  method 170 

Questions,  abstract,  discussed. .  129 

table  of  replies  to 124^128 

list  of 28 

of  comprehension 65,  224 

Race 92 

Rachitis 84 

Railroad  accident 228 

Rate  of  pronouncing  digits 188 

Reading 309 , 

Reading,  average  rapidity  for. . .  212 

selection 212 

with  two  memories 211 

with  six  memories 220 

Reasoned  comparisons 99 

Record,  method  of  keeping 295 

Recording  results 240 

Regard,  the 45 

Repetition,  effect  of 292 

of  figures 61,  187 

of  three  figures 53 

of  seven  figures 232 

of  sentences 58,  186 

of  sixteen  syllables 202 

of  twenty-six  syllables 232 

Reply,  ambiguous 123 

Replies,  examples  of  absurd 241 

grading  of 34 

Reproduction  of  the  thought  of 

Her vieu  (test  for  adults ) . . . .  287 

Resemblances 103 

of  objects 61 

Respiration  and  circulatory 

functions 85 

Retarded  child,  defined 70 

the  pedagogically 70 

pupils,  how  many  are  there. .  252 

Retardation,  a  relative  term...  267 

of  two  years,  suspicious 269 

Reversed  triangle 235 

Rhymes 63,  232 

Ribot 26 

Right  hand,  left  ear 201 

Rote  learning 42 


Salp^triere 140,  143 

Scale 292 

accuracy  of,  discussed 250 

limitations  of 239 

practical     suggestions    upon 

the 294 

proposed  corrections  to  the. . .  275 

revised  1911 276 

training  necessary  to  use 240 

the  use  of  the  measuring 261 

Scholastic,  aptitude,  distinction 
between  intelligence  and. . . .  253 
standing,    relations   between 

intellectual  level  and 288 

Science 315 

Scoring 69 

rule  for 244 

finai  rule 278 

illustrations 241 

illustrative  cases 245 

Secretary,  aid  of  a 295 

S6guin 24 

Sensorial  intelligence 112 

Sentence,  three  words  in 

65,  222,  229 

Sentences 104 

criticism  of 227 

list  of 187,  233 

placing  disarranged,  in  order.  231 

repetition  of 58,  186,  202,  232 

Seriation  of  weights 116 

Sex 92 

of  the  child 195 

Seven  year  old  children 207 

Shakespeare 123 

Shuttleworth  quoted 87 

Silly  sentences 228 

Sixty  words 229 

Six  year  old  children 201 

Size-weight  illusion 55 

Snare  of  lines 57 

Social  conditions,  differences  in 

the  intelligence 316 

Sollier,  classification  of 25 

Sommer,  German  alienist 73 

Speech,  retardation  of 79 

Spelling 307 

Square,  copying  a 198 


336 


INDEX 


Stamps 214 

Standardizations 73 

discussion  of  the  Scale 250 

number  passing  each  test  279-283 

Stigmata 84,  89 

String,  a  cup,  a  key 49 

Subnormal  defined 71 

Subnormal,  who  is 254 

Subnormals,   intellectual   level 

of 37 

of  the  primary  schools 167 

in  the  school 270 

Suggestibility 56,  97,  120 

Suggestion  of  lines 284 

test 121 

Suicide,  commit 229 

Symbols,  not  to  be  trusted 297 

Symptoms,  enumeration  of 21 

Syphilis 84 

Teachers,   attitude  of,   toward 

examinations 168 

Teacher's  questions 311 

Teachers,    three,    examine   the 
intelligence  of  five  children  312 

Teeth 84 

Temperature 86 

Ten  year  old  children 221 

Tests,  classification  of  the 237 

begin  with,   appropriate   for 

age 170 

final  rule  for  scoring 278 

irregularities  in  passing 282 

isolated,  of  little  value 329 

list  of  1908 238 

must  be  standardized 41 

number  passing  each  of  the 

279-283 

performed  prematurely 257 

practical     suggestion     upon 
the 294 


Tests,  revised  1911  list  of 276 

should    be    prepared    in    ad- 
vance    295 

use  of 41,  243 

Thirteen  year  old  children 234 

Three  words  in  one  sentence. . .     65 

Three  years,  children  of 184 

Thyroidine 268 

Time  required  for  psychological 

examination 91,  170 

Training,  necessary  to  use  scale  240 

Triangle,  the  reversed 235 

Tubercular  (stigmata) 84 

Tuberculosis,   per  cent  among 

parents,  etc 77 

Twelve  year  old  children 232 

Urinary  inferiority 79 

Vaney,  M 169 

Vaucluse 28 

Verbal  gaps  to  be  filled 64 

knowledge  of  pictures 50 

Vernier 315 

Voisin,  Dr 140 

classification  of 20 

Walking,  retardation  of 79 

Weights,  arrangement  of 

62,  119,  220 

comparison  of  two 55 

construction  of 220 

gaps  in 63 

omission  of 120 

What  ought  one  to  do? 65 

Whipple,  Guy  Montrose 274 

Words,  placing  disarranged,  in 

order 231 

Writing  from  dictation 216 


BIBLIOGRAPHY  ON  BINET-SIMON  TESTS 

Buffalo  Committee.     Informal  Conference  on  the  Binet-Simon  Scale. 

Jour.  Ed.  Psych.,  February,  1914,  Vol.  IV,  No.  2. 
Doll,  E.  A.    Note  on  the  Intelligence  Quotient.     Tr.  Sch.  Bull.,  Vol.  13, 

No.  2. 
GoDDARD,  H.  H.    Four  Hundred  Feeble-Minded  Children  Classified  by 

the  Binet  Method.    Ped.  Sem.,  September,  1910,  Vol.  17,  No.  3. 
GoDDARD,  H.  H.    Two  Thousand  Normal  Children  Measured  by  the  Binet- 
Simon  Measuring  Scale  of  Intelligence.     Ped.  Sem.,  June,  1911,  Vol. 

18,  No.  2. 
HuEY,  E.  B.    Backward  and  Feeble-Minded  Children.    Ed.  Psy.  Mon., 

Baltimore,  1912. 
KiTF,  E.  S.    The  Binet-Simon  Measuring  Scale  for  Intelligence.    Bull. 

No.  1,  Committee  on  Provision  for  the  Feeble-Minded,  Philadelphia, 

1916. 
KoHS,   S.   C.    The  Binet-Simon  Measuring  Scale  for  Intelligence.    An 

Annotated  Bibliography.    Jour.  Ed.  Psych.,  April,  May,  June,  1914, 

Vol.  V,  Nos.  4,  5,  6,  (254  titles). 
KuHLMAN,    F.    Results   of   Grading   Thirteen   Hundred   Feeble-Minded 

Children  with  the  Binet-Simon  Tests.    Jour.  Ed.  Psych.,  May,  1913, 

Vol.  IV,  No.  5. 
Rogers,  A.  L.  and  McIntyre,  J.  L.    The  Measurement  of  Intelligence  in 

Children  by  the  Binet-Simon  scale.     Brit.  Jour.  Psych.,  October,  1914, 

Vol.  VII,  No.  3. 
ScHWEGLER,  R.  A.     A  Teacher's  Manual  for  the  Use  of  the  Binet-Simon 

Scale  of  Intelligence.    Univ.  of  Kansas  School  of  Education,  1914. 

(Selected  Bibliography  of  56  titles.) 
Stern,  W.    Psychological  Methods  of  Testing  Intelligence.    Ed.  Psych. 

Mon.,  13,  Baltimore,  1914.     (Bibliography  appended.) 
Stern,  W.    Der  Intelligenzquotient  als  Mass  der  kindlichen  Intelligenz, 

insbesondre  der  unternormalen.    Zt.  f.  Angew.  Psych.,  January,  1916, 

Vol.  XI,  No,  1, 
Tbrman,  L.  M.    The  Stanford  Revision  and  Extension  of  the  Binet-Simon 

Scale.    Buckel  Foundation,  1915. 
Terman,  L.  M.    Suggestions  for  Revising,  Extending  and  Supplementing 

the  Binet  Intelligence  Tests.    Psychological  Principles  Underlying 

the  Binet  Scale.     Jour.  Psycho.  Asthenics,  Vol.  XVIII,  Nos.  1  and  2. 
Town,  C.  H.  (Translator),  Binet,  A.,  and  Simon,  Th. — A  Method  of  Meas- 
uring the  Development  of  the  Intelligence  in  Young  Children.     1913, 

Lincoln,  III. 
Whipple,  G.  M.    Manual  of  Mental  and  Physical  Tests.    Baltimore,  1910. 


The  Following  Pages  Contain  Advertisements  of  Books 
and  Pamphlets  from  the  Vineland  Laboratory 


FEEBLE-MINDEDNESS:  ITS  CAUSES  AND  CONSEQUENCES 

BY  HENRY  H.  GODDARD,  PH.D. 

Cloth,  8vo,  599  pp.,  $4.00  postpaid 

"A  book  based  upon  a  case  study  of  mental  defectiveness  carried  out 
by  the  Vineland  Research  Laboratory.  It  contains  a  report  of  327  cases 
investigated  by  field  workers  with  conclusions  drawn  from  them  and  com- 
ments on  the  relation  of  feeble-mindedness  to  such  social  problems  as 
prostitution,  alcoholism,  pauperism,  etc.  Contents:  Social  problems; 
Reliability  of  the  data;  The  data;  Causes;  Discussion  of  the  data;  Mendel's 
law  of  inheritance;  Is  feeble-mindedness  a  unit  character?  Is  the  inheri- 
tance of  feeble-mindedness  in  accordance  with  the  Mendelian  law?  Eu- 
genics; Practical  Applications." — Book  Review  Digest. 

"The  work  stands  pre-eminent  in  presenting  the  largest  and  most  com- 
plete collection  of  the  first-hand  data  concerning  feeble-minded  people 
that  has  yet  been  produced. — The  Survey. 

"Dr.  Goddard  has  performed  an  invaluable  service  in  writing  this  book, 
which  may  be  recommended  without  reserve  to  physicians,  educators,  legis- 
lators, and  all  others  who  are  interested  in  social  welfare." — Medical 
Record. 

"Not  only  the  psychologist  and  special  student,  but  teachers,  parents 
and  social  workers  will  find  this  book  a  dependable  and  illuminating  treat- 
ment of  the  many  degrees  of  variation  from  the  normal  that  exist  in  cer- 
tain children,  as  it  is,  also,  a  profoundly  suggestive  study  of  what  may  be 
done  with  this  unfortunate  class." — Washington,  D.  C,  Star. 

"Dr.  Goddard  will  be  remembered  as  the  author  of  'The  Kallikak 
Family,'  perhaps  the  most  absorbing  narrative  ever  written  in  its  par- 
ticular field;  the  present  volume  possesses  a  similar  interest,  though  the 
field  of  treatment  is  necessarily  broader  and  the  histories  of  the  subjects 
briefer." — Springfield,  Mass.,  Republican. 

"Every  reader  of  the  book  must  be  struck  by  the  accuracy  with  which 
the  investigation  has  been  carried  on,  the  care  with  which  the  data  have 
been  checked  up,  and  the  conscientious  conservatism  which  has  guarded 
the  writer  in  his  somewhat  radical  conclusions." — M.  A.  Hopkins. 

For  Sale  at  The  Training  School  at  Vineland,  New  Jersey 


Two  More  Books  by  the  Same  Author 


THE  KALLIKAK  FAMILY 
Cloth,  8vo,  $1.60  postpaid 

"Dr.  Goddard's  book  gives  the  thoughtful  reader  much  food  for  reflec 
tion.  It  demonstrates  most  forcibly  that  the  feeble-minded  in  our  midst 
constitute  a  distinct  menace  to  our  social  life." — Medical  Times. 

"No  more  striking  example  of  the  supreme  force  of  heredity  could  be 
desired." — The  Dial. 

"The  most  illuminating  and  complete  of  all  the  studies  in  heredity  that 
have  ever  been  made,  with  the  view  of  showing  the  descent  of  mental 
deficiency." — Bull,  oj  the  Medical  and  Chirurgical  Faculty  of  Maryland. 

"Dr.  Goddard  has  made  a  'find';  and  he  has  also  had  the  training  which 
enables  him  to  utilize  his  discovery  to  the  utmost." — American  Journal  oj 
Psychology. 

"I  doubt  if  there  is  in  all  literature  a  more  damning  presentation  of 
how  one  single  sin  can  perpetuate  itself  in  generations  of  untold  misery  and 
suffering,  to  the  end  of  time." — Editor  Minneapolis  Journal. 


SCHOOL  TRAINING  OF  DEFECTIVE  CHILDREN 
Cloth,  98  pp.,  90  cents  postpaid 

"The  book  is  a  comprehensive  study  of  the  defective  child  problem  and 
should  be  found  useful  to  all  who  are  seeking  help  towards  its  solution. 
It  should  prove  exceptionally  useful  to  school  teachers  in  the  'grades,' 
who  are  constantly  confronted  with  the  problems  involved  in  the  care  and 
training  of  mental  defectives." — Springfield,  Mass.,  Republican. 

"The  picking  out  of  defective  children  from  among  the  whole  school 
population,  and  the  proper  plan  of  training  them  is  discussed  in  detail  by 
Dr.  Goddard,  with  special  attention  to  the  new  provisions  which  need  to 
be  made  in  school  organization,  equipment,  selection  of  teachers  and  su- 
perintendence. The  book  is  short,  very  readable  and  not  lacking  in  in- 
direct light  on  the  training  of  the  normal  child." — Boston  Evening  Tran- 
script. 

"It  is  brief  and  clearly  written  and  puts  the  problem  with  which  it  deals 
before  the  public  in  a  forcible  and  simple  fashion." — Nation. 

"Nowhere  is  there  to  be  found  so  useful  and  all  round  treatment  of 
these  problems  in  the  public  schools." — Journal  of  Education. 

For  Sale  at  The  Training  School  at  Vin eland,  New  Jersey 


Latest  Book  by  Dr.  Goddard 


THE  CRIMINAL  IMBECILE 

(An  Analysis  of  Three  Remarkable  Murder  Cases) 

Cloth,  8vo,  $1.60  postpaid 

"Mr.  Goddard,  director  of  the  department  of  research  at  the  Vineland 
Training  School  and  author  of  '  The  Kallikak  Family'  presents  in  this  book 
an  analysis  of  three  murder  cases.  He  considers  them  typical  of  a  large 
proportion  of  criminal  cases  in  which  the  relation  of  imbecility  to  crime  is 
not  taken  into  account.  He  believes  that  'a  clear  conception  of  the  nature 
of  the  imbecile  and  of  his  relation  to  crime  will  inevitably  result  in  a  most 
desirable  change  in  our  criminal  procedure.'  The  cases  described  were  the 
first  in  which  the  Binet-Simon  tests  were  admitted  in  evidence." — Book 
Review  Digest. 

"Dr.  Goddard  gives  us  a  competent,  scientific  analysis  of  three  murder 
cases.  He  is  able  to  show  in  plain  judicial  and  convincing  fashion  that 
the  three  culprits  were  actually  imbeciles,  and  as  such,  irresponsible. 
There  is  no  waste  sentimentality  about  the  book;  the  scientific  data  present 
themselves.  It  is  refreshing  to  know  that  there  are  adequate  scientific  tests 
which  can  actually  be  utilized  for  a  court  of  law,  and  that  these  tests 
promise  to  go  far  to  eradicate  the  scandals  of  expert  testimony  in  cases 
of  alleged  insanity  of  acknowledged  criminals." — Boston  Herald. 

John  W.  Davis,  director  of  the  Bureau  of  Attendance  of  the  Depart- 
ment of  Education  of  New  York  City  says,  "Permit  me  to  congratulate 
you  on  presenting  clearly  and  succinctly  a  matter  that  should  be  better 
understood  by  our  professions.  Chapters  IV  and  V  should  be  in  the 
hands  of  every  teacher,  even  though  the  whole  book  could  not  be." 

"Teachers,  priests,  parents  and  preachers  would  do  well  to  read  this 
book  for  themselves." — Cleveland  Leader. 

"A  conspicuously  illuminating  piece  of  work  that  should  mark  a  new 
epoch  in  the  treatment  of  this  type  of  criminal," — J.  P.  Lichtenberger. 

"The  contribution  is  peculiarly  valuable  in  showing  how  the  recogni- 
tion of  abnormality  is  an  expert  matter." — Dial. 

"A  new  standard  has  been  established  in  criminal  procedure.  It  ha® 
been  recognized  that  weakness  of  mind,  or  in  other  words  feeble-mind" 
edness,  as  an  excuse  for  crime  is  in  the  same  category  with  insanity.  This 
means  little  less  than  a  revolution  in  the  treatment  of  criminals.  Mr. 
Goddard's  book,  giving  very  valuable  information,  has  also  the  interest  of 
romance." — Boston  Transcript. 

For  Sale  at  The  Training  School  at  Vineland,  New  Jersey 


THE  INTELLIGENCE  OF  THE  FEEBLE-MINDED,  INCLUDING  A 
STUDY  OF  THEIR  LANGUAGE  AND  A  COMPARISON  OF 
FEEBLE-MINDEDNESS  WITH  DEMENTIA.  By  A.  Binet,  Sc.D., 
andTh.  Simon,  M.D.  Translated  by  Elizabeth  S.  Kite.  Cloth.  8vo, 
about  300  pp.    Price  $2.00  postpaid. 

This  volume  is  a  supplement  to  **The  Development  of  Intelligence 
in  Children"  and  gives  Binet' s  and  Simon's  own  application  of  their 
scale  to  the  problem  of  feeble-mindedness.  It  is  the  most  complete 
psychological  scientific  study  of  mental  defectives  that  has  ever  been 
made.  It  should  be  in  the  hands  of  everyone  who  would  understand 
the  problem. 

ANTHROPOMETRY    AS    AN    AID    TO    MENTAL    DIAGNOSIS.     A 

simple  method  for  examination  of  subnormals.  By  Edgar  A.  Doll, 
Assistant  Psychologist  of  the  Research  Department  of  the  Training 
School,  Vineland,  N.  J.     (75  cents.) 

This  book  shows  a  new  and  simple  method  of  making  a  pre- 
liminary diagnosis  of  feeble-mindedness  by  means  of  six  anthropo- 
metric measurements.  It  is  based  on  a  statistical  study  of  normal 
and  defective  children. 

THE    BINET-SIMON  MEASURING    SCALE    FOR    INTELLIGENCE. 

Revised  Edition.  An  adaptation  of  Binet' s  last  Scale  for  use  with 
American  children.  A  most  convenient  form  for  those  who  would  use 
the  Scale  with  school  children.     (15  cents.) 

SENSORY  DISCRIMINATION  IN  NORMAL  AND  FEEBLE-MINDED 
CHILDREN.  An  experimental  study  of  discrimination  of  lifted 
weights  in  relation  to  mental  age.  By  Anna  M.  Petersen,  formerly 
research  student  and  E.  A.  Doll,  Assistant  Psychologist,  Research 
Department.    The  Training  School  at  Vineland.     (5  cents.) 

THE  HEIGHT  AND  WEIGHT  OF  FEEBLE-MINDED  CHILDREN  IN 
AMERICAN  INSTITUTIONS.  A  statistical  study  of  nearly  12,000 
mental  defectives  from  American  Institutions.  By  Henry  H.  God- 
dard.     (10  cents.) 

WOOLLEY  AND  FISCHER'S  "MENTAL  AND  PHYSICAL  MEASURE- 
MENTS OF  WORKING  CHILDREN."  A  Critical  Review.  By  E. 
A.  Doll.     (10  cents.) 


For  Sale  at  The  Training  School  at  Vineland,  New  Jersey 


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